Nil Desperandum
by Funsmoke
Summary: The movieverse life of your favourite firecracker, and insertion into which of one hairy Canadian wildman. Rated for coarse language and imagery. In Jubilee's POV. Now with 10% more attitude, with a side of gratuitous violence!
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I own nothing. Marvel does. Minors shouldn't drink. Uh…that about covers it, I think. Oh. And please review.

1

The worst thing about talking on the phone to an old boyfriend is that the lingering drama and emotional subtext always leave you more or less unaware of what's going on around you. Case in point, me, on a certain October evening in the middle of the week. Don't get me wrong, when you're a troubled mutant juvenile, it's always good to have buddies, but sometimes I kick myself for accepting the 'let's still be friends' speech.

So there I was, right, listening to Ev drone _on_ about, well, I don't really remember what it was about, but I'm sure I was concerned at the time, cause even with my mad ninja skills, I was unable to detect the car pulling into the drive, followed by the front door opening.

Now, you might say, 'come on, Lee, the front foyer of a Victorian mansion is so _not_ the place to have a serious and intimate conversation,' but to be totally frank, it's way less populous than, say, the dorm room I shared with Monet St. Perfect and the basket-case that is our resident Southern belle, Rogue. And since the rec-room, the library, any teacher's office, and certainly the classrooms are way out of the question, there I was.

Incidentally, I was in the middle of a desperately teenaged attempt to explain to Everett that, as I was up for review for the team, the big leagues, the black-leather-and-X-wearers, I would probably _not_ be speeding over to Boston for Christmas with his parents, and that he should've told them _yonks_ ago that we'd broken up, when I very elegantly, and with all the grace of my Olympic-level gymnastic training, fell on my butt. In my defense, I backed up into a wall first.

'You wanna look where you're goin', girl.' Said wall spoke gruffly, around a smouldering cigar end. I looked up.

'Yeah, well, you wanna look out who you pick fights with, mister.' Everett went into a hissy fit on the other end of the line, because I was talking to someone else while on the phone with him. 'Ev.' I grouched into the receiver, 'Dude. Chill the fuck out.' And I hung up.

Tall, dark, and scraggly looked at me through darkly amused blue eyes. 'That's a bit harsh.' He observed. I snorted.

'Obviously you've never had to deal with a possessive ex-boyfriend.'

'If I did, I don't remember.' He hoisted his duffel bag with a faintly resigned air.

'So you're back, huh?' I pretended it was a casual question, but just between you and me, I don't think he bought it. I mean, when your roommate (see above: basket-case Southern belle) is nursing a hero-worship crush on a dude, you _know_ about it, and I wasn't all too pleased to know that she would soon be turning into a squeeing, blushing, eye-batting fangirl. I mean, she had eighty per cent of the male population of the school eating out of her hand, but a Canadian wild man with just enough domestication not to eat on the floor turns her into aforementioned fangirl? Bitch, please.

'Guess so.' He replied casually, and as he turned out of the foyer, I saw that the back of his wool-insulated jean jacket was, well, decimated. There was a group of bullet wounds grouped suspiciously close round what I think was his spleen, and the blood soaking through the denim was only just drying. Ew. I followed him as he stalked (I kid you not, _stalked_) into an elevator.

'Dude, can you hit me up before you see Scooter for the first time, cause there's this _adorable_ pair of motorcycle boots I've been looking at, and I could make _bank_ selling tickets.'

He turned abruptly, and, reaching forward, poked me hard enough to send me stumbling backward out of the elevator. 'Go update your myspace page, kid.' He snarled.

'Want me to grab you some Ensure first, grandpappy?' I screehed as the doors slid closed between us. Smooth, Lee. Real smooth. Well, in all fairness, he looked beaten up, and I had a vague suspicion, based on the conspicuous battle-wounds, that he wasn't back so much for warm and fuzzy hand-holding with Rogue as for reinforcements. Whatever it was, I wasn't sure I wanted in. I dashed up to my dorm, and wished suddenly that I hadn't. 'Oh, my _God_, Rogue! Hang a freakin' hat on the door or _something_! I think I just threw up a little in my mouth.'

'Or you might try _knocking_.' Bobby hissed, as his partner-in-snogging tugged a sheet hastily over her chest.

'On my own bedroom door? Come on, Drake. You graduated with not-shitty grades.' I paused then, and, sighing at my sap-happy soft-heartedness, said, 'You have fifteen minutes, and if Monet comes back, I'm _not_ responsible for any following hysterics. You _know_ what a drama queen she is.' I turned and headed back out the door, feeling like a dear, sweet idiot. What the hell was I going to do to kill a quarter of an hour?

Moments later, my eyes were alight with unholy glee as I sped down the hall toward the lower levels. I knew just where I could find a bouncing blue somebody who shared my passion for junk food.

But Hank wasn't in his usual battle station in his stainless laboratory. The lights were on, as were a pair of Bundsen burners and an ocular device I'm pretty sure is illegal for civilian use, but no Beaster. After a quick glance, I borrowed the family-sized pack of Twinkies and went in search of Hank. I allowed myself some snooping, and, give the girl a prize, I found him in Med Bay. With Grouchy. Neither of them saw me as I came in the door, and, considering they both have some fierce sniffers, I must have been downwind or something. Logan was sitting bare-chested on a bed, and Hank was applying ultrasound gel to his back. If you squinted, you could imagine all sorts of naughty scenarios, but we all know that I'm not that kind of girl. Ahem.

'Logan,' Hank was saying, 'I'm not sure, even with your healing factor, that I can siply cut into you to remove it. From your description, it sounds like a mobile device, which can move unassisted around your body.'

'Look, McCoy, do what you've gotta do. There should be a pretty strong heat imprint.' He growled as Hank began to move the ultrasound sensor across his back. 'It's down near my left lung. I can feel it. It's hot as heck. Hurts.' He winced, and on the screen, both Hank and I were able to see, clearly, the outline of a small, spider-shaped something, floating eerily round inside his body. I figured now was the time to lay aside my ninja stealth. Tossing the package of Twinkies in the air and catching it, I stepped forward.

'Dude, that is mondo gross.' Hank look startled at my appearance, but Logan merely glanced my way. Yeah, he'd probalby known I was there since I'd stepped in the door. 'What the heck is it?'

'Some kinda tracking device.' Logan replied, and for the first time, I realised that he looked tired. His shoulders were bowed, hunched forward. There was a tightness in the corners of his eyes, and his lips were pinched. Not that I was staring at his lips or eyes or anything, cause that would be...uh…gross. 'It doesn't activate for another hour or so, but McCoy's bein' bashful about getting' rid of it.'

'Lemme see.' I brushed the ultrasound sensor away, and, pretending to ignore Hank's spluttering protestation, laid my hand, palm flat, against Logan's cool skin, still sticky from gel.

'What're you doing, kid?' Grouchy-butt demanded. I looked up at Hank, whose brain had already caught up. His deep blue eyes were as bright as one of my fireworks.

'Why, Jubilation, that's brilliant! Can you….' He hesitated. '…can you feel it?'

'Loud and strong, Beaster. Wolvie's right. It's real hot.'

A brief digression, for those who are unfamiliar with the finer points of my mutation. Technically, I'm pyrokinetic, but, because my powers deal with the transmutation of energy, I'm not only about to _make_ very hot things, I'm also able to _sense_ them. I'm invulnerable to fire, yes, and I make pretty fireworks, but I also have sort of a groovy spatial awareness based on heat. The fact that I didn't register Logan coming through the door is an indication of how much Everett pisses me off. Basically, I can sense things that give off enough heat. People, animals, mistreated computers, and that little spidery bugger in Logan's body. Anyhow, he didn't know me from Adam, and I don't blame him, with the amount of kids at Xavier's, so he obviously had significantly less of a clue about my mutation than, say, Hank, who nearly wet his pants when he found out I could sense heat signatures with enough proximity.

'What the hell is going on here, kid?' the Wolvster was getting, if possible, crankier.

'Waitaminute. You were trying to get Beaster to get at that, like, with a _scalpel_ or something?' the thing beneath my hand began to migrate lazily, and I followed it, idly noticing that Hank's very irritated patient was also very built. I guess a healing factor does wondrous things to a body.

'You have a better idea, kid?' he snapped back. Ooh, guess little Mr. Ew-Get-It-Out-Now doesn't like being condescended to. Well, neither did I, and that 'kid' business was starting to get on my nerves.

'Hank, which end do you figure he'd like it from?' I quipped, deliberately turning away from Logan. Hank gave me a reproving look.

'Do you think you could maintain a plasmoid in stasis for long enough? And could you contain the detonation enough to avoid significant damage? Forgive me, dear, but your restraint has been…occasionally in question.'

'Oh. Totally. Did you not _see_ my control read-outs last week? I'm the freaking _queen_ of control and restraint.' I winked. 'You know what they say. Beauty and brains, with a fetish for chains.' Logan's shoulder twitched marginally under the _completely involuntary_ continued exploration of his back. I'd completely lost track of the spidery thingie (yes, that's a technical term).

'Well,' I could tell Beast was having a crisis of conscience. On the one hand, there was the opportunity to conduct a dangerous experimental medical procedure on a patient that would almost certainly shake it off within ten minutes, and on the other hand, there was the Hippocratic Oath. 'Logan would have to consent to the…erm…the procedure.'

'What _exactly_ is going on?' I pivoted on my toes and assumed my best bedside manner. 'Well, honey, take a gander, and don't be scared.' I lifted my hand from his (deliciously sculpted—down, girl!) shoulder and generated a wonderfully sparkly and very non-intimidating pink plasmoid. 'This is a paff. Wolvie, paff, paff, Wolvie.'

'An' what, am I s'posed to be impressed?'

I grinned. 'Good thing you're pretty.' He didn't like that. Growled, in fact. 'It goes into you, and—' I detonated the little sparkly with a snap of my fingers, '—poof goes your spidey little problem. I promise it'll hurt less than Hank slicing you open like a Christmas ham.' He gave an involuntary shudder. 'Sorry, you not religious? _Holiday_ ham, then.' Without turning my head, I knew Hank was giving me a look. 'Anyhow, I can feel where your spidery little buddy is, cause of the heat it's putting off. Actually, judging by the coolness of the surrounding bits, it's probably leeching energy from you to start itself up.'

'So what you're saying is that you wanna put one of those…paffs…in my body, to blow up the tracking device.'

'Pretty much, yeah.'

He stared me steadily in the eye. I couldn't help but lift my chin a little, and reinfoce my psionic shields, even though I knew he had no psychic powers, but there was something unnerving about the way he was looking at, no, _through_ me. Finally, when I was _sure_ that soft violin music was meant to start playing, he nodded once, curt and certain. 'You'd better not put anything pink in me.' He leant back on his arms, and I glanced at Hank. He was so excited he was nearly shedding.

'Wonderful! Now, Jubilation, you're going to want to insert the plasmoid through his mouth, correct?' I shrugged.

'I can probably generate one directly in his body, if I concentrate hard enough.' I leant forward, ran my hands along Logan's back again, to locate the tracing device. A lump formed in my throat when I found it. 'It's just here,' my fingers tensed against his skin. 'near your heart.' Logan cursed softly. 'What does that mean?' I inquired, suddenly anxious.

'Means it's gonna hurt like a sonofabitch.' He replied, avoiding my eyes. 'Go on, kid. Do it.'

I nodded, and concentrated hard. I could feel the little tech piece pulling energy directly from his heart, pulsing eagerly with every beat. Very carefully, I wrapped it in a fluid pocket of plasmoid. I couldn't promise it wasn't pink, but it felt too tenuously powerful for that. The gadget began to suck heat from my plasmoid, and I increased its power, channelling a stronger connexion with me, adding layers, creating a web-like structure round the device, avoiding places I could feel were responsible for drawing power. Logan turned his head, and met my eyes again. He was tense, braced. 'Ready?' He nodded. 'Three, two, one.' And I let go.

It was a perfect tempest in a tea cup. Logan's body jerked between my hands, just once, hard. A hiss of breath exhaled from between his lips, and he went a little pale, bu the managed to remain upright. He was still looking into my eyes, and in his, there was an unspeakable trust. I looked away. I could no more hold his gaze than carve a facsimile of Mount Rushmore into the Jüngfrau. His hand touched me, unexpectedly, big and warm, wrapping round my wrist. 'Hey. Darlin'. I'm all right.' His voice was low and rough, threaded with pain, but stead. 'Ya did a good job.'

'Yeah.' I cleared my throat. 'Course I did. I'm Jubilation Lee, don'tchya know?' I nodded to him jerkily, fighting to pull the mask of indifference back on. I managed before I looked at Hank. 'So. I'm pretty sure I vaporised all the bits. You wanna do another quick ultrasound?'

'Nah, don't bother, McCoy.' Logan ground out, heaving himself to his feet. 'I'm gonna get some shut-eye. I owe ya one, kid.' He winked at me, and I grinned, still off kilter, but not feeling nearly as shitty.

'See ya round, Wolvie.' I flashed Hank a smile, nicked up a couple Twinkies, and headed back up to my dorm. I didn't realise I was shaking until I picked up my phone to check whether Ev had texted. The dorm was empty. I guessed Rogue and Bobby had gone off to his place. As for Monet, she was probably brooding on the roof with Remy or something. Ev had texted, incidentally. And called. Four times. I sighed and pressed my speed dial to voicemail, bracing for his barrage of guilt inducing messages. By the time they were over, I'd regained a sense of normalcy, and, after showering and checking my email, I turned in for the evening.

As I lay awake, I heart Rogue come back, and then, later, much later, came Moet. I was stoically faking sleep, partially trying to convince myself that sleep was actually possible. My eyes were startled open when, instead of heading for her own bet, Monet sat on the edge of mine. _'Jubilation,'_ She's a telepath. _'I know you are not asleep. Your poor shielding has been giving me a headache. You are usually very restrained. What is happening?'_

I opened my eyes. _'Nothing,'_ I thought back, consciously collecting the shreds of my unmonitored shields, _'nothing at all.'_

'_Very well.'_ She swept backward, and that was all. Weird.


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: Nothing is mine. All belongs to Marvel.

AN: Man, is everyone as psyched about the Wolverine film as I am?

Erm…quick note, this is mildly AU, in that I have tweaked it as I see fit. Rogue does not have her powers, but she's stayed on with Xavier's to complete her education. Jean didn't kill Scott at Alkali Lake, and Kurt is the same age as the upcoming generation. That is to say, nineteen, twenty.

Also, reviews are candy to me. If you submit a signed one, I'll probably reply to it. Uh…yeah. This is sort of an interim chappie, so stay tuned mah loves!

Oh, and anything offensive that's said by characters...think about the character, and whether their sense of humour would allow for it.

Rate M, still only for coarse language and general Jubilee-ness.

2

I woke up the next morning feeling like everything had rearranged itself. All right, I wasn't exactly happy about my Danger Room workout at eight in the morning, but that was typical Scott. Fortunately, he wasn't in the mood to run endurance drills, and my power read-outs weren't up for measure, so I found myself toe-to-toe with Kurt, in a powerless hand-to-hand workout.

Not to brag or anything, but out of all the spandex-suiters in the joint, Kurt's probably the only one who can outdo me acrobatically. Don't get me wrong, I've seen Remy pull some awfully fancy stuff, but he's still mostly just another dude. I mean, he has some extra long ligaments and tendons, and reinforced joints and all that groovy stuff, but he's still a dude, and there're cannot come quite to par with me, being a girl with hardcore, long-term gymnastic training. So when I met Kurt, I was surprised and delighted that he could actually manage all the stuff I can, only he puts all the force of male muscle behind it.

I was still a bit groggy, having spent a relatively sleepless night wondering what the hell was wrong with me, and why Wolverine had such a strange effect on me, so I guess I really deserved the solid thump Kurt gave me to set things off. Of course, he did only get the one hit out before I dodged, and you'd better believe that nothing gets your attention like a fuzzy blue elf with vampire fangs and yellow eyes kneeing you in the…well…kneeing you anywhere, really. In this case it was in the ribs. Toldja he's bendy. My body sprang into overdrive, and I went on the offensive, delivering a series of kicks and punches that would probably have laid anyone else out. Well, they would've toasted Bobby's muffin, that's for damned sure. Kurt slid along outside my reach like a snake, and, belatedly, I remembered that he has a fully prehensile tail. I dodged just as it shot forward to wrap round my ankle, and I swear Kurt pouted. We dodged, and weaved, mêlée style, which, admittedly, neither of us was comfortable with, particularly on the field. I, personally, prefer sneaking up on and incapacitating, and though my hand-to-hand skills are formidable, my power allows me to throw both paffs and insults from a safe distance. Kurt is similar, in that he prefers the element of surprise to out and out brawling, and he's also capable of teleporting to a safe distance if things get hair. Pun _not_ intended.

We traded blows silently, focusing on the patterns within patterns, and I guess it was my lucky day or something, cause after fourteen minutes of gruelling duelling (w00t, w00t! Lee the poet!), I landed a roundhouse to his solar plexus that left him stumbling backward, clutching his stomach. Again, softie me, I gasped and rushed over. Not before securing his yield from Scott up in the controller room, of course, but I knelt down beside him.

'Dude, I'm totally sorry. Are you winded?' he nodded jerkily, and I helped him to his feet as he caught his breath. 'You were awesome. My muscles hate you.' I gave him a quick, one-armed hug, mindful that we were both dripping sweat. 'You fuckin' rule.'

'Language, Jubilee.' Scott's voice boomed over the intercom.

'Whoopsy.' I grinned. 'So, what else? You gonna grade us?' I looked toward the hidden place where I knew the observation booth was.

'I'm going to go over your video, yes. You're both free to go. See me this afternoon at three, Jubilation.'

'You got it, boss man.' I nodded toward the booth. 'It's been fun, elf.' I winked. 'See ya, Kurt.'

'_Auf wiedersehn, liebling._' He called after me as I made a beeline for the locker room showers. For those of you who are clueless as to why we have these, try clambering up a flight of stairs _yourself_ next time you go through one of Scott's lovingly crafted four-hour endurance sims. Yes. They last that long. Yes, he will tell you (in so many words) to eat a dick if you don't last long enough. I'm convinced that somewhere deep down, inside Scooter's straight-laced exterior, what he _really_ wants to do is tie down some _lucky_ woman and spank her, all the while making her count spankings and thank him for them. Boy oh boy, that's _not_ an acceptable way to think about the Fearless Leader.

As I swung into the locker, something, or _someone_ caught my wrist. Their heat signature moved so quickly that I hardly had the time to register it before my body went into action. I twisted, bringing the heel of my free hand up hard into the chest of my assailant. Or I tried to. I hadn't expected him to grab my other wrist in a vise-like grip. 'Cool it, kid.' My brain registered, about a nanosecond later, that it was Growly-Studly-Heart-Explosion guy.

'Hiya, Wolvie.' I managed. 'What's cracking?'

He looked surprised, then annoyed, and surprised again. 'Look, kid—'

'And you can quit with the "kid" crap, too. I'm nineteen, okay?'

'Whatever. Look, I owe you a solid for what you did for me last night. I'd like to make it up to you.'

'What, like, as in, get me something nice?'

'A beer or two, if you want.' His smile was like, totally unnerving.

'And where do you propose we share these beers? I assume you don't want to drop them off in my mini-fridge.'

'No. Wait, you have a mini-fridge?'

I giggled, the residual adrenaline beginning to peel away. 'Nah. Just yanking your chain. So. You. Me. Beer. When?'

'I've gotta box of Red Hook in the fridge. You still have kids hanging out on the roof?'

'Hah. Yeah. Remy calls it "thinking." Whatever, it's totally brooding. But there should be a vacant balcony outside…outside Professor Xavier's old office.' I mentally chastised myself for slipping on his name. 'Anyhow, if you have the stones to share your booze with me, you've got the stones to break into Baldy's old digs. So I'll meet you there after dinner, say, eight thirty? And I've gotta go, cause I totally reek.'

He let go of my arm suddenly, like he didn't realise he'd been holding it in a freaking death grip for like two minutes now. He stared at the marks his fingers had left. 'All right. Eight thirty.'

I nodded, and zipped into the showers. Huh. Con-fusing.

My day was packed _full_. Xavier's had received university status a couple years ago, and I was busily engaged in both pre-med and child psychology for instructors. It's not like I wanted to be either a doctor or teacher. No. I knew what I wanted to do, but being an X-Man would be full of both medical and educational emergencies. Along with all that, I was studying advanced German and painting, unofficially, with Kurt and Piotr respectively, and I participated by default in Scott's military strategy lessons. Today we were studying fortification, particularly some castle in Albania that was reputedly impenetrable unless you bombed the holy bastard out of it. By the time I rushed to make my three o'clock with Scott, I was in desperate need of a coffee or something sugary.

Trust old Scooter to have all his campaigns planned. A caramel apple Danish and a cup of _café au lait_, with a slight aroma of mint were sitting on his desk. For a moment, I wondered what kind of trouble I was in, that needed such delicious padding. 'Come in, Jubilee.' He called, as I poked my head into the half-open door and knocked timidly. 'Sit down. Help yourself. Hank said you sometimes crash halfway through the day if you don't have sufficient blood sugar.'

'You are God.' I sighed, sinking into the chair. '_Domo_, dude.' I reached for the plate and mug, too overcome with culinary ecstasy to notice that Scott was standing in Fearless Leader position three, that is, with his back toward me, examining his bookshelves with his hands clasped behind his (very firm and fantastic) rear.

'Jubilee, I asked you here because it's come to my attention that you're…well, you seem to be special.'

I laughed raggedly. 'Dude, this is Xavier's Institute for the _Gifted_.' I said, around a mouthful of apples and pastry.

'Even among mutants. I spoke with Hank today.'

I choked on my gorgeous coffee. 'Dude, Hank said it was cool. And so did Wolverine. And I totally aced it. Was _nothing_ to worry about.'

He turned round. 'I'm not sure what you're talking about, but I'll leave that to Hank's discretion. I'm talking about your recent power readings. It appears as though you've been producing some very high-level readouts, and exhibiting remarkable levels of control.'

'So. I'm learning to control my powers. That's sort of the point. Kids do it every day.'

'It's not only that. I've spoken with some of our resident telepaths, Miss Braddock and Miss St. Croix among them. It appears as though you have a set of formidable mental shields which they have both been unable to penetrate, unless you are voluntarily broadcasting. Between this and the psionic nature of the control you have over your plasmoids, Hank is suggesting that you have not only Alpha Class potential, but the potential to develop a secondary mutation, most likely psionic in nature.' He glob of pastry in my mouth (unchewed, thank you Scott) went down my oesophagus with a thud.

'You're not serious.'

'That's right, I'm telling you this just to wind you up.' He replied, deadpan. Upon seeing my expression, he leant forward. 'Are you all right?'

'I'm cool, Scott. I just…gimme a second.' I took a long swallow of coffee. 'So, Hank thinks I'm a psi because I detonate my paffs with my brain. Sounds like a bit of a stretch to me.'

'What about Remy? His primary mutation has to do with sympathetic kinetics, potential energy. And his empathy can only operate on feelings already present in some form. Essentially, he augments where you create.'

'So what am I supposed to do about it?'

He smiled at me, the way he used to when I was in high school, and answered one of his dumb emotional intelligence questions correctly. 'I knew you'd see it practically. Hank thinks the firs thing to do would be the scan you pretty thoroughly. It's a shame that we don't have a psi on-staff with enough control to operate Cerebro, or it'd be a lot simpler.'

'What about Monet? She's powerful. And she has…some control.' I recalled a particular incident during which she had caused Everett to synch onto her power, and he carried it round for the next couple hours. The sex was incredible.

'She's very young, with not nearly enough control to handle Cerebro. I'm not willing to risk either yours safety or hers. Hank and I were actually thinking of starting with something as simple as a CT scan.'

'But when I came here, I had one of those.'

'And you've undoubtedly gone through some significant changes since then. We're not going to make you do anything, Jubilee, but we both think—and Ororo, too—that it's in your best interest to put a label on this possible secondary mutation as soon as possible. I don't personally think you're in any danger of incurring any psionic trauma, but this could be really exciting.'

'Yeah. All right. Can I have a talk with Hank about it before this goes down?'

'Of course. He's your consulting physician and primary care provider. I'd expect you to consult all the tests you're going to take with him.' He looked really closely at me, like he was expecting me to suddenly grow a second head, or maybe start bawling my eyes out. No such luck.

'All righty. Is that the whole deal? I get a rockin' cuppa and a pastry just for growing an extra mutation? I should totally do this more often. Thanks, Scott.' I was fully aware that I was technically supposed to be calling him Professor Summers, but to be honest, I think it makes him feel old. Also, to be more honest, as much of a dickwad as he can be about training, he's got a really good heart. As the song goes, he just can't catch a break. At least he doesn't whinge about his tough cookies, or go brood on the roof, even if he does bitch at me for eating sweets in class.

'Yeah. That's pretty much it.' I was about to abscond with what was left of my pastry, when he said my name.

'Yeah, Scooter?'

'You'll let me know if you're…I don't know…weirded out by anything.' He gave me the doofiest smile as he said 'weirded out.' My little heart went out for him, trying to get jiggy with the teenagers.

'Sure thing, Scooter. Whatever you need.'

'It's actually whatever _you_ need. So…yeah. Let me know. Please.'

'You've got it, man.' I threw him a cheeky wink as I headed out, and I think he bought that. It's not that I don't trust Scott. Far from it. I know the dude has my back on any given Sunday, out on the battlefield, but I had the sneaking suspicion that he didn't really _need_ to be dealing with my teenaged angst (which I am totally well equipped to handle) while still recovering from the death of his one-and-only. Jean was some kind of lady. I remember the first time I met her, or saw her, anyhow.

It was back in LA, a mall in Beverly Hills, and I was a scared eleven-year-old mallrat orphan, dodging the rent-a-cops and making fireworks displays for tips. She came breezing through with Ororo and Dr. MacTaggert, who'd been staying at Xavier's at the time. They were pretending to be shopping, but I could tell they were special. And probably not actually interested in the clothes hanging from the racks. I followed them, watching carefully and then, all of a sudden, Jean turned and looked straight at me. I was a bit thrown. I could feel her probing my shield, even though I didn't know what she was doing at the time. Didn't know that I had natural psi-shields. Matter of fact, the only way they'd found me was from some skeezy blogger who'd gotten my picture on their mobile and decided they'd do a little write up about itinerant performers. The Prof figured I was a mutant, and, on strength of a hunch, sent his ladies for me. Turns out they showed up just in time. The mall security had been getting fed up with me for a while now, and I'd not been thinking about them while following Jean, Ro, and the Doc, and they were about closing in on me. I realised it just a hair too late, but Jean was already on it.

'Oh my God!' she called sharply, 'Honey, it's you!' her face crumpled into a mask of emotional distress. She ran toward me, arms open. 'Oh, sweetie! You gave your father and I a heart attack! We've been looking for you _forever_!"

'I…I'm sorry, mum.' I stammered. 'I…my temper got away with me.' I played along, and we presented a suitably convincing image of a runaway daughter and panicked mother, though I don't pretend we could have gotten away with it if she hadn't telepathically convinced the security that she was a middle-aged Asian woman. The rest is history. They were cool enough to convince me to give Xavier's a shot. It meant three square meals a day, anyhow, and a warm place to sleep, and, also, an explanation as to what the heck was going on with my body.

Eight years later, there I was, leaving the office of the man who'd loved her, at a school that had no Moira MacTaggert, no Charles Xavier, and no Jean Grey. Yeah, it hurt. Whatever.

I headed off to my last class of the day, an unofficial painting class with Piotr. He was too young to be an official teacher, only two years older than me, but he's _really_ good. Knew his technical stuff, too. Anyhow, I guess he was doing some kind of concentration test, cause he had _Remy_ standing buck-ass naked on a little dais. There were about twelve girls that I'm pretty sure didn't belong there. It's not that Piotr didn't draw a fair crowd, but then again, he's not a notorious womaniser, being pretty much attached at the hip to Kitty. Whatev. I unpacked my drawing board and paper, and set up at my usual easel. I think I might've been the only one there _not_ blushing. Remy, for his part, was doing a really ace job of pretending to be a statue. I wondered idly whether he'd done modelling before—the naked kind. Then again, the dude is always a shameless exhibitionist. I guess if I had a body like that, I would be, too.

I tried to concentrate on my sketch, but my mind kept wandering. It wasn't wandering to Gumbo's naughty bits, either. No, I'd seen those. Don't look so shocked. The man has a penchant for skinny dipping in Breakstone in the middle of the night. So _what_ if a certain sparkler, who shall remain unnamed, also likes her midnight rambles? It's a free country. But like I said, it wasn't Remy I was thinking about. That was just the problem. If I _had_ been concentrating on his lean, sculpted physique, I probably would've had no trouble translating it into light and shadow. Instead, it was all the new developments that had sprung up on me over the past several hours.

I couldn't say I didn't want to be a psi. it was a rocking mutation, sure. But two of the world's most powerful telepaths had just bitten the dust in a magnificent way over the past year, and I _knew_ there was a host of other little problems that came along with telepathy that I just wasn't sure I could deal with. Most people don't think about it, but have you ever met anyone whose powers were psi-based who wasn't something of a hard-on? Really, think about it. They have finer motor control (except maybe the Prof), a tighter handle on their temper, their rooms are neater, they dress more fastidiously than almost anyone else. No kidding. Think about Jean. She was a soft-spoken, mild-mannered woman, a conservative dresser (if you didn't count the skin tight leather uniform) , with regular and strict habits. She was a doctor, which takes years of committed study. She was a teacher. A good one. That means putting up with rowdy, hormonal teenagers for most of the day, five days a week. More, because Xavier's is a boarding school. Monet, my roommate, is so controlled that she pauses before she does _anything_. A lot of people think it's just that she's being a priss cause of her aristocratic upbrighing, but it's her telepathy. I'm not good friends with her or anything, but she's got the old 'path paranoia. I think they've got it worse than anyone. Yeah, potentially, a pyrokinetic can blow up a building, but telepaths have the potential to change _people_, in ways so subtle even the person changed can't usually tell. And they might do it by accident, without knowing. A telepath needs always to be in control. You may have noticed that I'm not exactly that girl.

Buy the end of the half-hour allotted to sketching Remy, I'd managed a gesture of his arms, a teeny-tiny fig leap over his bits, and a cross-eyed cartoon face. Piotr nearly grinned at me, but caught himself and shook his head. Remy toured round, flirting with _everything_ (I think he even gave bedroom eyes to a book case), lazily pulling on a robe. When he got to my easel, he mock glared.

'Dat's not exactly accurate, is it, petite?'

'It was based on memory.' I grinned back.

'Well…' he shrugged. 'So Breakstone is cold, even in de summer, hein? It's only, _chat_, Remy knows y' secretly mad for him.'

'Well, I'd better go talk to this "Remy." Tell him all about my feelings.'

'Oh. An' what kind of feelings dose be?'

'You know, the standard. I want to make mad monkey love to him and bear his sons. That kind of thing.' His eyes went momentarily crossed. Yes, just like my picture.

'I'll…be sure t' tell him so, petite.'

'Ain't your petite, Gumbo.' I packed away the last of my pencils and detached my drawing from the easel. 'Here. A gift. When I'm rich and famous, you can sell it for millions.'

'Or when _I'm_ rich and famous,' he countered, snatching it up, 'maybe I'll send it back t'you, along with a couple chile support payments.' He shouldered me playfully on the way out.

'Repent!' I called after him. 'The curse of God is upon you!'

'From a heathen chink, no less.' He replied.

'Watchyer mouth, swamp rat.'

'In case y' decide t' bear my sons?'

'Or something.'

'Oh, one t'ing.' He paused, and turned round so I could catch up with him. 'Y'wanna shoot some pool after dinner?'

'Don't know.' I shrugged. 'Maybe I'll page your room.'

'Kay, petite. Stay safe. Dere are dangerous predators in dis world, dat would like not'ing more den to eat up a _belle_ little heathen like you.'

I watched him saunter away, confused. Could he have picked up on my plans for the night? Or was he just being his usual ridiculous self? Either way, I wasn't sure it mattered.


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer: See previous chappies. All that stands.

AN: Sorry for the brief chapter. The next one will probably be annoyingly long.

3

Dinner was, as usual, freaking incredible. When I first moved to the Mansion, I'd expected cafeteria style food. Heck, I'd gone to one of the most prestigious middle schools in Beverly Hills, and we were lucky to get mac and cheese. How I was mistaken. The Prof was a wealthy man from a very old, very good family, and he'd managed, through uncannily good investments, to bag an eight-figure annuity. Word on the street is that he was some kind of market mastermind and could predict the ups and downs to a T, but honestly, I think dosh had a little more to do with the semi-annual visits from a solemn, one-eyed man wearing a perfectly tailored suit and tie as though he'd much rather it were a set of fatigues. His name was never mentioned, but I knew from the first time I saw him that he was important, cause Ororo let him smoke cigars in the house.

Anyhow, I digress. The food. Right. Well, because of the pots of money spilling out of his pockets, the Prof was apparently able to hire a wonderfully talented staff, the kitchen detail of which catered for us on an in-house basis, and when we slummed it and had mac and cheese, you can bet that there were at least three perfectly balanced and aged cheeses involved, and that the macaroni was probably hand made the day before. Yep. That kind of good.

I usually do my best to sit relatively alone at meal times, because even after all this time, I still get the willies if someone sits close enough to steal a forkful of my grub. I almost speared Kitty with a butter knife once, and I tell you, she would've been a sliced little bagel if she hadn't phased, and fast. For some reason, even the semblance of solitude at Xavier's is a little difficult, mostly owing to the few hundred students crammed into the dining room at any given meal time. Even then, we eat in two shifts.

I generally am 'lucky' enough to secure a table with the allegedly popular crowd. Um. That means the loudmouthed flirts who somehow manage to get looked up to. This includes Remy (obviously. Too obnoxious to let himself be left out of this category), Bobby (not so obviously), Rogue (by default of being his girlfriend, and also conspicuously absent that evening), Warren (blond and gorgeous), Kitty (best grades in school, whose main squeeze Piotr also wasn't around), and Kurt (who's as much of a flirt as Remy, only you blush when he kisses your hand, instead of running off to get an STD test). I like them. They're good people. Good _kids_. Well, Kitty, Bobby, and Warren are kids. They've all had relatively normal lives, and even if their parents are a little weirded out about them being mutants, at least one of their parental party is alive. As for Remy, Kurt, and I, we're…different. Your freak's freaks.

We may strut around like we own the place, crack jokes and gum loudly, flaunt our powers, and dress flamboyantly, but really, if you go own deep enough, we're only performing. The world's our stage, and don't we know it. It's what we're good at. And if you pick away from long enough, you'll find that we're afraid of being alone. Well, not alone. We're used to _that_. It's more like…we're sure that at some point, the curtains will drop, and we'll have to take a bow and wipe off the makeup, hand in our costumes, and go back home, because this just isn't it. It's our stage, and we own it, for one night only. It's just an audience, and soon they're going to realise that our performance is rather unnecessary, even if it is entertaining. They might tip is, but they'll still show us the door.

No matter how long we stay, no matter how allegedly concrete our positions as team members, we're still scholarship kids. And maybe we cultivated that aura of detached aloofness that made the juniors stare in gap-mouthed awe, and caused the faculty to leave well enough alone when they saw we really needed it.

No amount of mysterious danger, however, has yet prevented Warren from staring down my shirt at every available chance.

'Seriously, dude,' I waved a forkful of steak at him, 'my face is up here.'

He had the decency to blush a little, but a lazy grin slowly spread across his face, and I swear I heard a little 'ting!' as light reflected off his teeth .'I wasn't looking for your face, Lee, I was looking at your tits, all right?'

Bobby snickered, but both Remy and Kurt leaned almost imperceptibly away from the table. 'I. See.' I replied, carefully laying aside my knife. 'And if I were, say, to walk by you in the corridor and feel you up, you'd be cool with that?'

He shrugged. 'Depends. How far you willing to go?' he winked. My eyes rolled of their own accord. See how impressed I am. Really. Wunderkind.

'As far as ten bucks'll get me, sweetheart.' His blush went deeper. He coughed, trying to play it off.

'You're thinking of LeBeau.' He began. 'Everyone knows he—' his voice choked into silence, and his eyes lifted to a point just behind me. I'd felt whoever it was sliding up behind me just a fraction of a second before, and the look on his face told me exactly who it was.

'Wolvie, what's crackin'?' I said, swivelling on the bench and looking up at him. He was holding a tray of food and idly nudging his asparagus with his knife, a suspicious look on his face.

'We still on, kid?' he asked, in a tone he tried to make casual but came off as deeply constipated.

'You betchya. Eight thirty, same place?'

He shrugged. 'Sounds doable. See ya then.' His gaze flicked to my eyes only briefly before scanning along my fellow diners, and he sauntered away, leaving me with an odd kind of unbalanced feeling, and Kitty's mouth hanging wide open.

'You know, if I get a picture of you, the things I could do in photoshop do not bear repeating.' I snarked, when he was probably out of hearing distance. She slapped my hand, probably harder than she realised.

'"Sounds doable"? Ohmygod! You're…was that a date kind of doable? Cause he definitely qualifies as grade A hot teacher material.'

'Grade A, Kitty? You need to lay off watching Nickelodeon. He's freaking backwoods Methuselah. Have you _seen_ my web browsing history lately? It consists of clean-shaved pretty boys with six packs and polo shirts, not hairy wild men who've just stumbled in from the freaking Yukon and think asparagus is a disease.'

'You were pretty on about Daniel Craig for just about ever.' Said Bobby archly.

'And anyhow, if y'like washboard abs, y'have only t'so mention de fact to Remy, who is more den happy t'—'

'I wear polo shirts!' Warren poked me. I shrugged.

'Boys, boys, settle down. Jubilation Lee loves all my babies. Except for you, Worthington, cause you're a schmooze.' I reached over and ruffled his hair. 'A very cute schmooze, but still. Anyhow, Daniel Craig defies the laws of old man-ness, because despite having a face like a toad, he's _sehr_ sexy, so he doesn't _technically_ count as a Methuselah, even if he _did_ offer advice on the wheel.' I protested. 'And you're not hairy, you're fuzzy, elf, so stop pouting.' I rubbed his shoulder reassuringly. 'And you also have better abs than Remy.' It was difficult not to be partial to Kurt. Sure, he had the religious thing going on, and that's not really common in young people, but he was mellow, and if he was a total flirt, he managed not to be a whore, which was class, and he was just…genuine. I knew that in the extremely unlikely case of experiencing any soul-searching moments, Kurt was probably the best person to help out any deep introspections if I ever felt the need.

'So?' Warren prodded my shin under the table with his toe, 'What's going on between you and…Wolvie?' his smirk could've greased axles.

'Yeah, to whom you're _not_ attracted, right?' Kitty leant forward on her elbows. Oh, God. The two of them were the biggest gossip mongers in the whole world. It was pathetic. I considered my options.

'Look, I wasn't gonna say anything, cause it's not, like confirmed or anything,' I managed to infuse a note of hesitance into my voice, 'but last night I went down to the lab, and Dr. McCoy was bored, and I was feeling unwelcome in my room for _some_ reason—' I glared meaningfully at Bobby, '—and he ran a couple tests and it looks like I'm still mutating. Anyhow, Wolverine was there too, and he was interested in how secondary mutations work, but you all know how impossible Blue is to understand, and, well, basically he wants someone to use little words to explain.'

They blinked vacantly as one. Remy's eyes narrowed. 'And you're jilting Remy t'go talk _science_ wit' de poster boy for _Alaskan Survivor's Weeky_?'

I shrugged. 'He offered beer. Good geer.'

'Sounds like a date to me, Lee.' Warren insisted.

'Well, it's not. Jesus, you guys are reading way too much into it. The poor guy's probably just embarrassed. And anyhow, you all know he's still…well…Dr. Grey.'

The name hung between us like a shroud. Bobby was the first to speak. 'Yeah. He'd probably have asked Rogue, only she spends most of her free time with me these days.' He looked a little guilty.

'And there you have it.' I said, triumphantly. 'Anyhow, I didn't jilt you, Gumbo. In fact, when I come get you for pool, you probably won't fail as spectacularly as you usually do if I have a couple beers in me.'

'Well, jus' make sure dat _home_ keeps his hands to himself, _hein_? I don't trust people dat ask pretty little Asian co-eds t' explain scientific theories over alcohol dat dey're not old enough to buy for demselves.'

'So…you don't trust about eighty per cent of the male population?' Warren looked puzzled.

Remy rolled his eyes. 'Sometimes, Worthington, y' don't know when t' shut de hell up.'


	4. Chapter 4

Disclaimer: I don't own anything from any fandoms mentioned herein. Specially not the X-Men. And I'm not making money from them, either. Yippee! Now, on to the

AN: Captain Mac, thanks for all your reviews, I appreciate them muchly. As for your pet peeve, I'm sorry it's such a biggie, and in the States, you would be correct about quotation marks being this symbol (") and apostrophes being this one ('). Howeva! My education brought me up a little differently, and we do things the other way around. This (') encapsulates a closed or direct quote, but I do appreciate the observation. It may be obsolete, but it is a legit way of doing things.

As for Kurt…well, I never liked the idea of Kurt, jr., either, but plot bunnies will be plot bunnies. Hopefully this chapter will enlighten you as to the reason. Hold on, it's a long one.

4

I was surprised to find that Professor Xavier's office door was still intact (i.e., hadn't actually been ripped off its hinges) come half past eight. Wolverine was already inside, I could feel his shape, outlined in phosphorescent blood and muscle against the cool night air. I twisted the handle and the door swung open on oiled hinges. He was out on the balcony, perched on the balustrade, his legs hanging down over what I knew was a solid forty foot drop, and he was halfway through a longneck. I hopped up beside him, snagging a beer out of the box on the ground. Without looking at me, he extended a single claw a couple of inches and levered off the cap. 'Sorry 'bout that scene in the mess hall, but I'm sure ya figured out a way to convince your buddies I ain't luring you up here to seduce you.'

I snickered. I should be so lucky. 'Yeah. Between my incredible intellect and your terror of green vegetables, I think I convinced them.' I took a long swallow of Red Hook. It's good beer, and it'd been a while since I'd had any.

'Terror of—' he began, an eyebrow raised, but he stopped himself. 'Never mind. I don't wanna know. But in case you were wondering, I like asparagus. Good for…good for the blood.'

'And you need all the help you can get after last night, huh?' he nodded gloomily. 'So what happened, anyhow? You've been away for a couple of months, sure, that's standard. You do it all the time. Drives Scooter up the wall. I think he wants you to commit to a long-term relationship instead of just sleeping with him.' He snorted. 'Really, though. When you show back up, you're usually strong as a horse. You show up and you flash money around, help us prod some buttocks, and then you clear out again. I've never seen you that beaten up, and I've _never_ seen that kind of tech. I thought we had all the best gadgets, but—anyhow. What's the dealio? Where were you?'

He was watching me steadily. It was still unnerving. There was nothing like it, really. I hadn't noticed it before, but now I could clearly feel the way his metal-bonded skeleton was outlined hard against his body. It retained much more heat than bone. 'You're awful observant.' He said quietly. 'Noticing how often I come here, how long I stay, what I do.' There was more than a shade of suspicion in his voice.

'Yeah. It's hard not to. I have to listen to Rogue bitching about it when you leave.'

Something flickered behind his eyes. Relief? Guilt? 'Right.' He looked away, chuckled. 'She's your roommate, isn't she?' he scratched his chin thoughtfully.

'Yep.'

'I think I must've met you before.' He looked at me again, just a glance. I nodded.

'Uh huh.' I gave him a second. 'Oh, wait. I forgot. You must be getting senile in your old age, grandpappy.'

'You make another crack about Ensure, kid, you can go get some chocolate milk.' He replied sharply, but with a feral grin that I couldn't help but respond to. We drank in companionable silence for a moment, then he seemed to think of something. 'Rogue _bitches_?'

I laughed. 'You bet your ass. Not that I would accept it as a legit bet, but yeah.'

'Huh. She ain't never said anything about it to me.'

I rolled my eyes. 'Dude. I know you like to think that you're close and all, but I'm a girl, and I've spent more than a week at a time with her, no offence, so I _think_ I know her a bit better than you do, at least when it comes to knowing stuff like, say, that she goes into a month-long sulk ever time you leave. I mean, it's not like she's not into her boyfriend. It makes me a little sick the mooky way they go to puddles of fluffy-bunny luuurve every time they're together, but you're…also special to her. There's still a little bit of you rattling around in her head. She growls in the mornings, and every now and again, she starts craving steak, even though she's a vegetarian. I mean, she even defies Scott every chance she gets because she has some weird sense of solidarity or something.' I paused, wondering whether I should carry on. Ah, well. It was a nice life while it lasted. I might as well go whole hog for my buddy. 'I found her once, crying at Jean's grave. She wasn't crying like a girl, either.' I didn't bother looking at him. I could feel his heart rate increasing, blood heating.

'And just what am I supposed to do about that? She's not a kid anymore. It ain't my fault. Life hands everyone hard knocks and I try to spend time with her when I can.'

'Well, you could try talking to her instead of throwing cash at her. Just a thought, ya know. Might make her feel like a friend instead of a responsibility.' I paused, tripped the bottle up-end to catch the last inch of cool, frothy brew, and leant back to snag another two, one for each of us. He popped them open. 'I know you're a good guy.' He snorted. 'Not a nice guy. Except when it comes to offering cute Asian co-eds drinks they can't buy themselves.' I parroted Remy. 'But you care about Rogue, and I know you wanna be part of her life. That's cool. She cares about you, too. And like you said, she's not a kid anymore. She's a woman with her own life, and sooner or later, the whole hero slash damsel in distress chemistry isn't gonna work anymore.' I realised I was preaching, but hey, he was listening. 'You're never gonna figure out how you fit into each other's lives if you don't talk.'

He was quiet for a while, smoking, with even, steady breaths. 'Ya sure have a lot to say for someone who just met me.'

'Nah. I was one of the kids that got nabbed during the Stryker mission. I was at Alkali Lake when Jean died.' I didn't know whether I was proud or ashamed of myself for speaking without a single stammer and sounding like I didn't give a damn. Another stare. Damned if he didn't see right through me, and knew that I knew. 'Anyhow. I was useless. They drugged us up. Did you know?'

'Bet you would've saved us all if you hadn't been.' He drawled.

'Your sarcasm is duly noted.' I sniffed. 'But probably not. I'm no leader. One of nature's privates, me.' His raised eyebrow said it all. 'Oh, shaddup. Anyhow, we ran a Danger Room sim together, in case you don't recall.' He squinted his eyes up, and I repressed a giggle. He was doing such a _good_ job of looking big, dumb, and only nominally sober. Trouble was, I knew he was none of those things. Well, okay, so he's built like a brick wall, but one out of three is the guy who gets beaten up.

'I think I might.' He muttered. 'We finished the sim and some kid came sniffin' around like he was afraid I was gonna throw you over my shoulder and haul you off to my cave or something.'

'Oh God.' I hid my face in my hands. 'That was Everett. He's not here anymore. Goes to school in Boston. Thinks he's going to be a criminal prosecutor.'

'Boyfriend?'

'Ex, thank God.'

'He seemed like a nice kid. Decent. Bit whiny, and no man should treat a woman like property, but he'll learn.' I could feel him making an immense effort to be interested in me, could almost hear the tumblers in his brain thudding into place. 'Why'd you split?'

'Cause he treated me like property. And he was a bit of a douche, too.'

'Ah, every woman says that.'

'I'm not every woman. I'm very tolerant. I was. Until he started putting the moves on my roommate.'

'Whoa. Wait.' He looked startled. 'Rogue?'

'Nah. There are three girls to a university dorm. Monet St. Croix, resident Monacan aristocrat.'

'Oh. Good luck with that.' He sent me a humourless, one-sided grin. I shrugged.

'She's not bad. Keeps out of my way nowadays, but she helped me with trig, back in high school.'

'You have faults? Amazing.'

'I'm dyscalculic, ya smartass.'

'Huh. That was awful nice of her, anyhow. Puttin' up with your attitude _and_ your learning disabilities.'

'Disability singular, buttface.' Oh, yeah, Lee. Ma-ture. 'Anyhow.' I nudged his booted toes with mine. 'What happened to you? Where'd that bug thingie come from?'

'Why're you so damned interested?'

'Because.' I braced myself, then faced him head on. 'You've come back here, and anything hardcore enough to use that kind of tech will figure out where you've gone. Have you talked to Scott about this?'

He nodded. 'It's got something to do with him, I think. It's complicated.'

'Oh, yeah? Like, how?' he gave me a blank stare. 'Like, are we talking Matrix sequels complicated or Scarlett O'Hara complicated?'

He cracked another grin. 'Ain't sure. Maybe a bit of both.'

'Well, shit.' I finished my beer. 'Well, you sure as hell aren't Neo, so I guess the only question is, are you Rhett or Ashley?'

'My dear,' he said, around a mouthful of cigar, 'I don't give a damn.'

'A'course. Why not?' I chuckled. 'Okay. So does this have anything to do with this mysterious past I hear you're lugging around like a bad case of herpes?'

'Kind of. I think. There's a woman.'

'There's always a woman.' He helped me uncap another bottle. I was feeling dizzy enough to need to stand on something solid, so I slid back up onto the balcony, and leant my elbows on the balustrade beside him. '_Cherchez la femme_, and all that.'

'I don't think it's like that. She…I remember a bit. I remember when she was a kid.' He hesitated. 'I think she was…I think she was mine.'

'Daughter?' I ventured. Jubilation Lee, super sleuth.

'Nah. Smells wrong. I think I took care of her, though. I recognised her, right off the bat, and she recognised me, too. Called me…' he hesitated. 'Called me Patch. Said something about Madripoor. Mentioned a bar. I told her I don't remember anything much, and she was about to fill in the details when some kinda…cyborg-lookin' thing came through the wall and started taking shots at me. She jumped in and fought him, but he hit me, and the tracker assembled itself from tech inside the bullets. Don't know how I know, but I…I remember seein' something similar once upon a time. I knew it would swim around in my innards for about six hours gathering energy before it could start transmitting a location. So I headed up here.'

'That is…fucking crazy.' I conceded, and toasted him jokingly. 'Sounds like an episode of Star Trek. Course, this whole thing,' I waved the beer to encompass the grounds, 'is like an episode of Star Trek, so I can't really judge.'

He laughed quietly, shrugging. 'That ain't the least of it.'

'Oh? This gets weirder?'

'Yep.' He paused. 'You're gonna think I'm crazy.'

'I already do. No worries.'

'I smelled something—some _one_—familiar. On her, on her clothes and skin.'

'Dude,' I nudged him in the ribs with my elbow, 'quit with the suspense. My patience is so limited.'

He shook his head. 'You aren't gonna believe me. But I swear to God that I smelled Summers on her. Or someone related to him. Closely related.'

I blinked. 'Wow. That is…' I paused for a chug of Red Hook. '…fuckin' Twilight Zone shit.'

'Yeah. S'the only reason the cyborg bastard got a shot in. That and Neena.' He sighed. 'The skirt. That's her name.'

'The "skirt," huh? What is this, 1940?' I teased. I wobbled. 'Damn it. I need to slow down. I haven't had anything to drink in a while.' He had the decency to look a little embarrassed.

'You aren't gonna rat me out to Summers, are you?'

I stared at him. 'Why the hell would I do that?'

He shrugged. 'Don't know. Contributing to the delinquency of a minor.' He grinned. 'Could get some steep jail time for that here in the States, couldn't I?'

'Yeah. Cause being a mutant vigilante isn't bad enough, right? Please. Scott's probably just happy I'm not in the rec-room shooting pool and vodka with Remy. He's learnt to expect a little hell-raising from the both of us, I think.' I didn't specify whether I meant Remy and I, or Logan and I.

'Remy…' he said. 'He's the kid with the eyes.'

'Yes.' I hesitated. 'He's a good sort. Tried to go out with Rogue for a while, actually, but she wasn't having it.'

'Don't blame her. He _ain't_ a good sort, kid.'

'Thanks, Wolvie.' I laughed. 'The warning is much needed. You're all heart.' After a pause, I added, 'And it's Jubilee.'

'Then you can quit calling me your little pet name, too.'

'Awh. But you look like a Wolvie. Fuzzy and snarly.' Oh, no. First sign of overdrinking, I start getting cutesy, and I'm reduced to using words ending in –y in my descriptions of anything from crazy clawed wild men to, well, me.

'But if you want to keep all your vital organs in the same places they are now, you're gonna start calling me Logan.' He insisted, but in a playful tone that convinced me that he was probably totally joking. Probably.

'You got it.' I swigged in silence for a moment.

'So,' he said, sliding down from the railing and turning to face me, leaning sideways, 'you reckon I should talk to her more? Rogue, I mean?' there were enough sparking, raw nerves in his voice to hotwire a monster truck.

'Don't you want to?' he shrugged, began peeling the label off his bottle, tossed it over the balcony onto the lawn. 'You know, Ororo will have you cut up into little bitty pieces for that.'

'Nah. She likes me too much. Anyhow, I'm not sure what I'm supposed to talk to her about. I don't really wanna know about her boyfriend, and fashion isn't really my thing.'

'Well, what did you used to talk about with her?'

'I don't know.' He patted his pockets, producing a pack of cigarettes, and tapping one free. 'He offered me the carton. 'You smoke?'

'Nope. Thanks for offering to pollute my lungs as well as my liver, though.' He shrugged, put one between his lips, and began the routine smoker's search for matches or a lighter. I paffed the horrid thing to life.

'Thanks, darlin'.' He exhaled, smoke issuing in a blue stream from between his lips. 'Pass me another beer.' I did. He waved the cigarette vaguely as he started in on me again. 'Look, the thing about me an' Rogue is that back when I first met her, I was…I was just…wasn't much more'n an animal. And anyhow, she was scared and alone, and not much interested in talking. Suited me fine. I'm not much of a talker.'

'You're doing fine now.' I pointed out. 'But I see what you're getting at. Rogue's not a scared little girl anymore, and you're not sure where you fit. So? I'm pretty sure you have a lot in common. What kind of music do you like?'

He shrugged. 'Don't know. Classic rock. Some country, maybe some jazz.'

'Classics man. Well, I happen to know that Rogue is a huge fan of the Doors, with a real soft spot for Stephane Grappelli. Granted, the latter was inherited from Monet, but still. Girl's got taste. And you're both stubborn, I'll bet, and ballsy. Well, you have balls, and she's a brave girl. And you're both nice enough, once you get past all the loner bullshit. Which really _is_ bullshit on her part. And you're both generous people.'

He snickered. 'Generous, eh?'

'You're sharing your booze, ain'tchya? And she lends me shoes and makeup when I need them. Only difference between the two of you, so far as I can see, is that I can wipe the floor with her in the Danger Room, or anywhere else for that matter, powers or no, and you…well, I'm not sure about you. You might take longer.'

He grunted. 'Big talk for a little girl.'

'Yeah, well. I'm a fast little girl with a big punch.'

He grinned. 'For some reason, I'm inclined not to doubt that.' I found myself smiling back. He really did have a nice smile, sharp white teeth gleaming in the dark. 'Ya know, you ain't half bad for one of these spandex-brigade do gooders.'

I laughed. 'Thanks. You aren't half bad for someone who was probably on the planning committee for dirt.'

He looked momentarily horrified, but recovered. 'What did I tell you about calling me old, ya little brat?'

'I think you said you were gonna buy me chocolate milk. You charmer, you.' I summoned up the ancient weapon of batting big anime eyes at him, a well used secret tactic of women the globe over.

'Oh, you're on.' He said, knocking his beer back. 'You'n'me. Tomorrow's Saturday. What time's good for you?'

'Whoa. Wait. You seem a bit eager. Don'tchya know you're supposed to wait three days after the first date to call again?'

'I don't mean that, darlin'.' Something in the way he growled the word made it sound like exactly the opposite of an endearment. Either that, or I was gonna need a safe word, and fast.

'Well what is Saturday supposed to be good for?'

'To see just how squeaky clean I can make the floor with one Jubilation Lee. We won't need the Danger Room. We can meet out in the little Japanese rock garden. The sand'll be nice and soft, so your tailbone doesn't break when you fall on your ass. Interesting footwork to compensate for the shifting ground, too.' He murmured, almost distractedly. 'You seem like the kind to sleep late. Three in the pm sound good to you?'

'Do I score another couple beers if I show?'

'Sure, why not?' he raised his head, and I looked round. There were still three lonely looking bottles in the box. 'I'll have to pick up another case. Do you think…' he hesitated. 'Does Rogue drink at all?'

It was cute, watching him squirm in abject embarrassment, kind of like watching a non-custodial father trying to reach out to a teenaged daughter in a bad movie. Except this was, well, it was almost completely different. Logan was different. For one thing, he was hoping she'd come drink with him. 'Yeah. Every now and again. Monet's dad sent her some bottles of champagne for her birthday a few months ago, and we had a girl's night in with Kitty and Kurt.'

'Kurt?' his eyes sharpened marginally.

'Yeah. He's really good at doing hair and makeup. And he's handy for running down to the pantry for, like, chocolate and stuff.'

'And he's another "good sort," right?' there was an edge in his voice.

'Chill, Wolvie. Kurt's a hardcore Catholic. He's probably not even _allowed_ to think naughty thoughts without doing like, a bajillion hail Marys or something. Although I've always thought that he could probably do some _wicked_ things with his tail.'

'Whoa. That's enough. Catholic. I get it. Right.' He paused. 'Didn't I read somewhere that all mutants had been excommunicated or something?'

'Nah. The Vatican's very progressive. There was a diocese somewhere in Spain that threatened to excommunicate its mutant parishioners, but someone mysteriously found some very incriminating pictures of him in a compromising position with a call girl. Several compromising positions, actually.' The internet is a wonderful thing. 'It was _quite_ the scandal.'

'No way.' He smiled. 'Not a little choir boy this time?'

'That's not fair.' I protested. 'Just think about being celibate _your_ whole life.'

'You ain't defending paedophiles.' He snarled.

'Nope. Not on your life. But I believe we were talking about hookers, dude. I mean, come on. Sure the guy was a bigoted anti-mutant asshole when it comes to the question of genetics, but, like, I'm a chick and I'm _already_ climbing the walls after a two-month dry spell. Apparently it's worse for dudes. I wouldn't know.'

'That how long ago you split with your boyfriend?'

'Nah, that happened like, ages ago. Three, four months.'

He turned his head and gave me what might be called an old-fashioned look. This one had single-celled organisms swimming around in it, wondering whether evolution was really worth all the trouble. 'Ages ago, huh?'

'Oh, shaddup.' I elbowed him again. 'Anyhow, I probably wouldn't still be single, only Kitty and Rogue freaking will _not_ mind their own business. They keep trying to hook me up with the biggest d-bags out there. Or, rather, in here.'

'D-bags.' He repeated slowly, an amused smile lifting the corner of his mouth.

'Yep. You would be totally sympathetic if you had Angelo Espinosa shoved at you. I mean, he's cool to hang out with and everything, but as a boyfriend? He's a freaking chain-smoking gang member. No offence.' I waved a hand toward him and his Mr. Tough-Guy image, complete with Accessory Cigarette.

'None taken. So they tried hooking you up with this guy, and you aren't all that into him.'

'Dude, I have not even gotten started. That was numero uno, hotshot. Kitty's been trying to shove me into Warren Worthington's pants for the past two weeks, and he's a schmuck whose daddy owns everything. Before him, it was, I kid-you-not, Sam Guthrie, who's like, totally hot in a blue-collar, farm-boy way, and oh, my freaking God my knees turned into jelly when he was mowing the lawn without a shirt on, with a pushmower, no less, but he can't exactly carry a decent conversation to save his life. And he's a very… _good_ boy. I think he might be like, saving himself for marriage or something, which is kind of creepy. Even Kurt only thinks people have to be in _lurve_ in order to do the nasty.'

The look on Logan's face was as close to priceless as makes no difference. He looked like he'd been holding his breath for about half a minute too long, and his eyes were almost crossed. 'Lemme get this straight,' he choked, punctuating his opening phrase by crushing his cigarette out on the balustrade between us, 'Too poor, too rich, too normal. That about the size of it?' he grinned and did a suggestive eyebrow-lifting-thing. 'You're into the elf, aren't you?'

'What? Bollocks.' I felt my cheeks heating up. Damn it. 'No! he's a buddy. We're not _like_ that. Besides, I kicked his fuzzy blue rear in the Danger Room today. It's very important for a man to be able to physically coerce a woman into doing important things. Like the dishes.'

Logan's grin turned even more leering. 'You like him. I can tell. You got all bothered when you mentioned him.'

'Bothered? As in…oh. Ew.' I felt my blush going incandescent as he tapped his nose meaningfully. 'No way. You can tell when I'm turned on?'

'Yep.'

'Wow. That's like, totally humiliating. Okay, pre-emptive strike. If we're throwing down tomorrow and I get…you know…bothered, it's only because I like big sweaty muscles and being held down. Nothing to do with you at all.'

'Guess I'll just have to try harder.' He stared into the neck of his beer like it was gonna bring peace to the Middle East.

'Oh, please don't. You're already annoyingly sexy.' To my credit, he actually looked shocked. Damn it, I was shocked, too. Bloody alcohol was making me way too chatty.

'Never been called annoying before.'

'Psch. Bet loads of people called you annoying, and then you cut them up into little pieces, so they didn't tell their buddies.'

'Could be. There's a whole lotta stuff that I don't remember, darlin'.' It was weird. I mean, I've hung out with some totally bi-polar guys before. Ev's a champion mood-swinger. Puts menopausal women to shame, but this…this was different. Even Everett never went from flirting to angsting in nought point two. Logan just had. Weird.

'Well, you keep drinking and tonight's shaping up to go the same way.'

'Nah.' He brightened a little, but only marginally. 'I'd have to drink a whole helluva lot more'n this to put a dent in my healing factor. A bottle of whiskey, chugged straight, on an empty stomach, usually gets me feelin' okay.'

'That seems a bit inconvenient and expensive.'

'Can be.' He leaned closer, as though sharing a state secret. 'But I'm loaded, so it's okay.'

I looked him up and down, at the worn grey wife-beater and ragged plaid flannel, jeans with threadbare knees, and the battered motorcycle boots. All right, those were probably worth a couple hundred new, but they looked twenty years old. 'Right.' I glanced at the bottle in his hand. 'Not a dent, huh, chief?'

'Nothing wrong with being comfortable.'

'Touché.' Then my brain nudged me, and I chuckled. 'You know what, I think I'm loaded too, only it's all tied up in red tape and property. When I turned eighteen, I got a letter saying a bank account with half a million was now available to me, along with a package of information as long as the Bible telling me all about my assets.'

'I thought…' he appeared to think hard for a send. I could almost see the blood struggling to his brain against the pull of all those pretty muscles. 'Ororo said you're an orphan. That they picked you up off the street.'

'Yeah. Well, was going through a bit of a defiant stage. Like I said, apparently it was all tied up till I turned eighteen, and even then the one bank account was only released because I was enrolled in college. If I don't graduate with the right GPA, I think I lose a bunch of property and bonds. My mum and dad were very hardcore about education.'

'That's a good incentive, I guess. So,' he extended his bottle, 'to hidden wealth?'

'Pots of it.' I agreed, clinked, and chugged. After the standard companionable-silence moment had elapsed, I muttered, 'Hey, it's been awesome hanging out, but it's getting late, and I promised Remy I'd hand him is ass over a game of pool, so I'd better get going. You should go give Rogue the heads up about tomorrow, find out if she wants to hang out with you. Oh, if there's a hat on the doorknob, I wouldn't bother.' I glanced round at the empties lined up against the wall. 'I'd help you clean up, but…'

'Don't worry about it. Maybe it'll do my rep good, if I dump a whole case in the bin without any ostensible drinking buddies.'

'Ooh. "Ostensible," huh? Pullin' out the ten-dollar words on me. She's impressed, Wolvie. Really, she is.'

'You start talkin' about yourself in the third person, and I will take you over my knee, young lady.'

Oh my God. My libido did _not_ need the mental picture. 'You been asking round about my fetishes?' I demanded, hands planted on hips.

'Nah, darlin', just a lucky guess.'

I giggled (rather drunkenly, in retrospect) as I headed down the corridor to the dorm wing, and managed to remain upright as I banged into the room Remy shared with Piotr and Warren. '_Benedictite, mes fils!_' I hollered, striking a (questionably) heroic pose. 'And how are we hanging tonight?'

Remy glanced up from the magazine he had been flipping through. Something about rappelling. Huh. He exchanged a look with Warren, who was on his laptop with his shirt off. Probably posing for whoever was on the other end of his webcam. 'Right. Maybe y' shouldn't be in de rec-room wit' dat…I mean…till y' feel better.'

'I feel great.'

'I meant sober.'

'Oh, fuck off, Gumbo, I'm fine.' I insisted, elbowing him over so that I could flop down beside him. 'I was so much worse on St. Patrick's Day.'

'Kurt had to tie your hands together with his tail to stop you from grabbing Mr. Summers' ass.' Warren muttered, sounding disgusted.

'Maybe I just wanted Kurt to tie me up.' I stuck my tongue out in his direction. 'Anyhow, Remy, m'love, m'heart, some billiards, please?' I flashed my baby blues and conjured up the most Disney Princess look I could manage. He narrowed his glowing red on black eyes.

'You ain't tryin' t' manipulate me, are you, petite?'

'Tsch. Not on your life. I'm just being nice. Anyhow, you were wangsting over getting jilted. Come on, it's like, not even ten o'clock yet.'

He leaned back against the pillow, and tucked me up against him. 'Don't know, petite, Remy's awful comfortable jest lyin' here wit' dis _très belle femme_ dat's got such blue eyes. What he want t' play pool for?'

'Ugh. Keep referring to yourself in the third person, and I'll…I'll have Logan take you over his knee.'

He laughed, a good hearty belly laugh. 'Wouldn't y' jest love dat?' he elbowed me in the ribs, then launched himself to his feet, taking me with him. 'Come on, den. Professor Summers jus' bought a new PlayStation 3, and I have a game I want t' kick y'r cute little rear at.'

'You're on!' I waved to Warren. 'I call player one!'

'_Merde._ Y'know I hate dat.' Remy pouted as we trailed down the stairs, nearly bowling a group of high school freshmen over.

'Tough cookies, swamp rat. You gonna brood on the roof about that, too?'

'Nah, I'll jus' whup y'r ass at Halo.'

'Hah. You wish. Dweeb.' As we raced down to the rec-room, I found myself purposely _not_ looking round for Kurt. We really _were_ just buddies, damn it. And not like, super close, either. I mean, we didn't squirrel into each other's pants or anything. We just got along. I hung out with Remy way more than I did with Kurt. Really.

As I waited for Remy to boot the pair of mouthbreathers off the new game console, I wondered vaguely just how much of a third wheel I was going to feel with Logan and right the next day. Ah, whatev. Different problem for a different day. I flopped down on the couch and snatched the controller, waiting for the boot screen to load. For now, I would settle for watching Rikimari get his butt handed to him by Ayame for once.


	5. Chapter 5

Disclaimer: I don't own the things that the big rich people own. I don't make profit from them. I wouldn't be writing fanfiction if I did.

AN: No disrespect to Garth Brooks meant. I actually totally love the song mentioned herein. I do, however, despise Toby Keith with a vengeance. No disrespect to people who like him.

Also, I'm sorry for the glaring typos scattered throughout. I'm gonna clean them up as soon as this fic is finished. It's actually complete and sitting in my notebook, so no fear of me going on indefinite hiatus like I have with my PoTO fics.

On with another long bloody chapter.

5

The Jews have it right. Saturday, or Shevvat, really is a holy day. Sandwiched beautifully between half-hassled Friday and hung-over Sunday, it's the few perfect hours where anything can happen. Including getting the beat down from a big hairy Canadian in less time than it takes for Remy to suck down a contraband cig.

Now, I still haven't found out who the _hell_ spread it round the school that Wolverine and Jubilee were going toe-to-toe in the Zen garden, but by the time three o'clock rolled round, the news had gotten so mainstream that _Scott_ freaking _Summers_ showed, his eyes unreadable behind his opaque sunglasses and a strange little smile playing around his mouth. Pretty mouth. Oh, ew. There is now way to say that in a way that doesn't bring to mind gap-toothed yokels playing banjos in the Appalachian wilderness. But I digress. What I was _saying_ was that if I ever _do_ find out who gabbed to the press, there's a can of whup-ass reserved specially for them. And we all know how well tins keep.

Anyhow, suffice it to say that I was already nervous about sparring with Logan, and it didn't help that about fifty freaking people showed up to watch him use me as the world's first human Zen rake.

I found him standing by a stone lantern, puffing a cigar to life. When he caught sight of me, he raised a brow, and sniffed. 'I take it that you're about as surprised about this as I am.' It was a statement.

'Yep. What's going on?'

'Don't know. I think LeBeau's running a book.'

'What're the odds?' oh, please. I was curious. Wouldn't you be?

'Three to one.'

'Jesus. They really think I'm gonna get creamed.' I sighed. He chuckled.

'It's three to one against me, darlin'. Looks like your buddies are pretty confident in you. Still, I bet pretty high on myself. So did Summers, to his credit.' I laughed, even though a weird, dark pit was yawning open in my stomach. Scooter betting against me? Not good. If anyone knew my limits, it was him. 'To be fair, I think he just thought I needed the encouragement.'

I shrugged. 'You seem pretty used to this. Putting on a show, looking calm and arrogant.'

He looked sideways at me. 'And you ain't?' damn it, he was right.

'Yeah, well.' I sighed. 'Okay. You still wanna do this?'

'We should probably lay down some ground rules.'

'What, like no crotch shots or fish hooking?'

'Yeah. And you should have a handicap, cause I can't turn off my healing factor.'

'Right. But I can light you up like a Christmas tree if I use my powers.'

'So how bout I don't spring my claws, and I stop using any limb that you injure badly enough, as if it weren't healing?'

'Fair enough.' I nodded. 'Sounds good. No time limit?'

'No time limit. No fish hooking, no crotch shots.' He added.

'Okay. And winning?'

'Let's say, either unresolvable restraint or incapacitation.' I nodded. 'All right, darlin'. Wanna limber up? I've already asked Cyke to ref.'

'Good deal. You let him know the rules, too.' I dropped into a stretch as he stalked toward Scott. There were about a bajillion thoughts going through my mind, not the least of which was a mantra of 'ohshitohshitoshitohshit.' I watched Logan chat to Scott, then Rogue, and shuck his boots and socks, then his shirt. Hell-the fuck-oh Messieurs the Rippling Pectoral Brothers. I kicked off my trainers and, as I'd come wearing loose sweat pants and a sports bra, stepped to meet him in the centre of the sand garden. Everyone shut up. It was pretty cool, actually. He grinned uneasily at me, and I was pleased to see that he looked a little nervous. 'Shall we?' He dropped into a bow as fluid as a river bend, which surprised me, but I returned it. '_Domo_, bitch.'

'Now that's what I like,' he replied, 'a woman that thanks me for a spanking.'

I suppressed the urge to laugh as Scott shouted the rules and Logan leapt with a grace that belied his bulk. I dipped beneath him and let him go hurtling past, but he curled into a dive and came up grinning.

'_Damn it, he's fast,_ I thought, suppressing the urge to panic, which, as I understand, is the sane reaction to a huge man bearing down on you with an insane smile splitting his face. _'But he's still a guy. I'm smaller and faster and more flexible. I can do this.'_

I surged to my feet. He was circling now, and I took two steps forward and engaged, just to see what his defences were like. I landed two punches to his kidneys before he caught on. _'Okay. Healing factor makes him a bit of a daredevil.'_ I danced out of his way before he could catch me. If he got me in a hold, any hold, I was done for. He's a hell of a lot stronger than I am, and if he could hold me down, that was it. I needed to end this as fast as possible. _'Maybe if I broke his neck…urgh. Adamantium bones.'_ But his joints would be vulnerable.

I flipped over him (yes, the height on my jumps can get _that_ good), and rammed a fist into his spine, locking a leg round his and pulling it, hard, toward me. It would've worked on an actual mortal man. His knee locked, but didn't pop back. Shit. I landed another blow to his lungs, and just managed to avoid the worst of his backward-thrust elbow. _'Oh God, this is it, I'm going down. This guy is tough.'_ I dived between his legs and, aiming a foot at each knee cap, kicked. Hard. This time, I managed it. I felt the ligaments tear, watched the sockets pop free. Ew. He fell, cursing and snarling, but still, terrifyingly, grinning, and as I scrabbled to my feet, my luck finally ran out.

He caught me by the ankle, and despite the frankly brilliant blows I rained down on his face (my knuckles took three days to heal, his nose took about twenty seconds), he had me face down in the sand with my ass in the air and my arms shoved up behind my back. Despite being in some pain from the restraint method, the bruises on my knuckles, and the sensation of gritty sand being ground into my cheek, having Logan's glorious body sweating and coiling against my back was, well, glorious.

Distantly, I heard Scott declaring Logan the winner in the smug tones of a man who has just won a good deal of money, but the only thing that registered was the warm breath against my ear. 'Didn't lie about that whole holding down thing, eh?'

I laughed raggedly as he let go, and watched him push his knees back into the right places with a grimace. 'You bet I didn't. Pre-emptive strike, I told you.' I staggered to my feet and held out a hand to pull him up. I think he probably meant to fetch up full against me, so that for a moment we were in a very romance novel cover pose.

'Down by the lake, after we've both showered,' he said, and bowed again.

'You got it.' I grinned back, as he stumbled over to Remy to collect his earnings.

Kitty rounded on me as I struggled into my shoes and socks. I hadn't _really_ taken much of a beaten, but for some reason, all my joints had gone to liquid. 'Oh my _God_, you kicked _ass_!' she enthused.

'What're you talking about? He won.'

'Yeah, but he's like a deadly ninja master, and you actually kicked in his kneecaps! Rogue said he got shot in the _head_ once, and it only got him about half a minute to get back up. And you landed way more hits than he did.'

'I still lost.'

'And the _looks_ you two were giving each other.' She breezed on, like I hadn't said anything, 'Whoo-ee. No chemistry, my ass. If all of us hadn't been here, you two would've been sucking face like there was no _mañana_.'

'It's called exertion, Pryde. Speeds up the heart, puts a flush in your cheeks. Not everyone who breathes heavily around each other is madly in lust.'

'Scuse me,' Rogue materialised on the other side of me, taking my arm, 'Yah don't mind if Ah borrow Jubilee for a second, do you? Thanks.' She steered me across the lawn toward the kitchen entrance.

'Hey, Rogue. Nice of you to give a girl a hand.' She stopped, and turned me round to face her like I was a truant child.

'What is going on?' she demanded.

'Shit. Not you, too.' She looked puzzled at this.

'Not me too, what?'

'Kitty's convinced I want Logan's body and vice versa, which, just so you know, and don't try to rip my face off, is hogwash.'

'Oh.' She laughed. 'Now that you mention it, Ah _did_ see steam coming outta your ears when he had you pinned, but Ah was actually wondering what exactly happened yesterday. He showed up in our room, all awkward and smelling like a dive bar ashtray wanting to talk. And he smelled like that jasmine lotion you wear. And now he wants to meet me up by the lake in half an hour to share some beer with you two. It's weird.' She blushed as I studied her, twirling a strand of platinum white hair around her finger.

'I don't know what he said to you, but I just told him I thought he should spend some quality time with you, instead of just flashing his credit card.' _'Why would he smell like my lotion? We weren't touching.'_

'Hey. Ah don't mind when he flashes his credit card.'

'And I'm sure he'll carry on doing that. But don't you want him to fit into your life? Isn't that what you've gone on and _on_ to me about whenever he takes off?'

'Yeah, but…' she hesitated, and blushed further. 'Ah guess Ah never expected you to stick up for me to him, is all.' She fell into step with me as we headed up to the house. 'So, you lookin' to jump him?'

I shrugged. 'You know where I sleep, and I don't want you murdering me in my bed.'

'Ah wouldn't. So? You like him.'

'Nah. He doesn't seem like the kind of guy to sleep with a buddy and let things stay cool. I don't think he knows how personal boundaries work. He's a too-much or too-little kind of guy, who might swing wildly between the two at any given moment.'

'You saying he's immature?'

I grinned. 'Yeah, pretty much.'

'You know, yah might be right about that.' She giggled. 'Y'all had better go shower. You reek.'

She was right. And a shower never felt so good. All the sweat and sludge and grit and fear swirled away down the drain, and I considered ditching Logan and Rogue for a half-hour soak in the tub and a good book, but I reconsidered. I didn't want to seem like a sore loser, and anyhow, I'd probably ditch them pretty quickly. I felt like I needed some alone time, and not the kind that involved Remy and half a bottle of Stoli. I tugged on a pair of jeans and a camisole and headed down to the lake, picking up a bag of pretzels on my way through the pantry. Oh, come on. Pretzels and beer are classic buddies. And these were awesome honey mustard pretzels, so take your carb-counting judgment elsewhere.

Rogue was there already, sitting at the end of the fishing pier, her bare feet dangling in the water. She didn't hear me until I slid down beside her, tearing open the bag of pretzels and offering her some. 'Hey. Ooh. Honey mustard.' She scooped up a handful, and we sat shoulder-to-shoulder in companionable crunchy silence. Finally, she said, 'So are you gonna go out with Warren?'

'Nope.'

'Why not? Ah thought you said he looks like an Adonis.' She smiled at me, jostling me with her elbow.

'Yeah, but he has the personality of mayonnaise.'

'Rich, thick, and oily?' she giggled.

'Yeah. He doesn't smell of eggs, though. And I bet he's never made a sandwich in his life.'

'You need to stop reading that Discworld dreck.' She said, in her oddly endearing bossy matriarchal voice. 'Your obsession with that Duke Vimes makes me nervous. Your eyes don't go all soft and glittery for real men the way they do for him.'

'What? He's hot.' I poked her. 'Bet you'd go for Captain Carrot.'

'Tsch. Who _wouldn't_?' I threw a pretzel at her.

'Loser.'

'Why don't yah like Warren? Ah mean, aside from the fact that he's perfect? He has a thing for you, yah know. Not serious, but he thinks you're cute.'

'I am cute.' I shrugged. 'I mean, I'm not some Valkyrie goddess like Monet, but I'm…bendy, and Asian, and I have nice tits, and I'm good in bed. I'm a reasonably attractive girl.'

'And Warren is hot. Betsy says he can do things with his tongue that _still_ make her toes curl. And they've been split for weeks now.'

'I'm not in the mood for Warren.' I shrugged. 'He's cool, but just not my style.'

'You hang out with Remy an awful lot.'

'And you know how he is. Mucho grande manwhore. Maybe I'm just not interested in guys right now.' I saw cogwheels start to turn behind her eyes, and added hastily, 'Or girls. Christ, I don't need to be in a relationship in order to be emotionally validated, Rogue.'

'Yah don't need ta be in a _relationship_,' he accent surfaced more strongly, indicating that she was annoyed, 'Yoah just so…so _tetchy_ when yoah not gettin' laid.'

The sound of grass rustling behind us in the still afternoon air brought the hair at the back of my neck to attention. 'Sounds like I arrived just in time.' There was a streak of sarcasm a mile wide in Logan's amused tone. 'Ladies,' he sat a pair of six packs down on the pier, flicked a bottle-opener at me. I snatched it out of the air, and uncapped three.

'I was _going_ to say, thanksforthebeer, that Rogue makes me sound like some kind of sex-crazy nymphomaniac, which, thank you, I am _not_.' I gave her a look that she apparently failed to take note of.

'Yoah tetchy, though, when you're not gettin' any. Remy says that you fried the player one game controller from the new PlayStation when he infiltrated yoah…uh…village or something.' Rogue's not much of a gamer.

'Tsch. I'd do that anyhow. He was being a dick about it. The dumb thing is that he's been levelling up his character all week while I've been doing fucking _endurance_ drills with ol' Fearless. That's as good as cheating.'

'Seems to me,' Logan supplied, 'that _someone_ was complaining last night about climbing walls and dry spells.'

'Ooh thank you, Mr. Helpful.' I snarled. 'I see someone's gone over all confident, just because I refrained from turning him into the first human lightbulb. You wanna go round two, with fewer restrictions?'

'She says, as she drinks my beer,' he leant back, supporting himself on his elbows, and, golly, it sure helped me focus for the next smartass comment as his abs and chest shifted against the probably two-sizes-too-small tee-shirt he was wearing. Unfair! Unfair!

'Ah. Have I mentioned how wonderfully witty and charming and generally godlike you are?' I think I managed not to sound too sincere, but only just. Rogue's eyebrows were raised, and as I was between her and Logan, he didn't see the expression she wore as she looked from me to him. I shook my head marginally.

'Actually,' he carried on, unfazed by my razor-keen wit, 'you didn't do half bad. Went for my weakest structural points, within the rules, and you did take me down. You're fast as hell, too. Jesus, I can see why everyone was bettin' so high.'

'Despite myself, I was flattered. As usual, I covered with bravado. 'Dude, you should see me go up against someone who _isn't_ freaking invulnerable.'

'Might just.'

'Rogue's pretty good, too,' I sense that she was drawing into herself, 'She hits hard, and she keeps a cool head.' She blushed.

'Yeah, but Ah don't have the athletic background you have.' She protested.

'Tsch. You're a fast learner. Ororo says she could be a team leader if she stays on.' Like any well brought up Southern woman, she fought back with kindness in the absence of fried food.

'And you ace all the strategy tests Scott gives us.'

'Yeah, but I'ma grunt and we all know it. Think about the teamwork exercises he makes us do. Am I _ever_ in the freaking huddle? Norsirreebob. Anyhow, I personally think the rating system is flawed.' I glanced sideways at Logan, then back at Rogue. Yep. Not worth the extra beer to rain on their parade. 'Oh. Crap. Speaking of systems, I was supposed to run into town to replace the controlled I fried last night. I'd better not finish this. Here, Wolvie, drink up.' I shoved the beer into his hand. 'Mkay. You kids need anything from the store? Soda, crisps, a new copy of Grand Theft Auto? No? Coolio.' I dusted my hands on my jeans and stood. Rogue was studying the pretzels in her hand like the SAT prep book, and Logan was giving me a long, thoughtful look. Damn it.

'Need a ride?' he asked, after what seemed like just a breath too long.

'No!' I said, a bit too quickly and emphatically. He raised an eyebrow. 'I mean, no, don't worry about it. Settle in, drink your beer. I'll go hunt up some keys.' I made a weird awkward goodbye gesture to Rogue. 'Catch you guys later. Don't wait up for me.' With a wink and a saucy sway that I didn't exactly feel, I headed for the garage.

Truth be told, I shouldn't have gad to do hunting up keys at all. I should've had my own car by now. I'd already cleared it with the faculty, and Scott still maintained an empty spot in the garage for me. The thing was…well, it was stupid, really. But when the whole Stryker thing went down, Jean had been helping me choose a car, and after she died…it just didn't seem right. I can't explain it. I found the nearest intercom and paged the lab.

'Hello?' Hank's voice came crackling through a moment later.

'Heya, Blue, what's up?'

'Jubilation. With what may I assist you today?'

'I kinda need to run into town.'

'And do I deduce correctly that you wish to borrow Celeste for this errand of yours?'

'Wha? Oh. Your truck. Yeah, that's right, you clever man, you.'

'My keys are on the pegboard. Be so good as to sign your name on the form.'

'You've got it, Blue. Thanks a million and a half.'

'And would you mind picking up some Twinkies?' there was a hopeful quaver in his voice. I chuckled.

'And two percent milk?'

'Ah, Jubilation, such a favour would elect you to very apotheosis in my eyes for a duration of at least one blissful week.'

'Ooh. How does a girl resist an offer like that?' I cooed. 'Catch ya later. Kiss kiss.' I snagged the keys to Hank's truck as I passed the pegboard and signed the little book that was posted beside the keys. It was a good system, if a bit typical of Scott's overly level headed micromanagement. I was just buckling myself in when my phone jangled to life. 'Lee's House of Dread, how may I help you?'

'Hey.'

'Logan? How did you get this number? What do you want?' okay, so maybe I wasn't as gracious as I could've been, but he was _supposed_ to be spending time with Rogue.

'Are you all right, kid?' he asked, voice at a funny balance. 'Ya kind of rabbited on us.'

'Yeah. Sorry bout that, but I promised Remy a Half Life tournament, and I can't exactly beat him if I don't have a controller.'

'Right. Ya know, you ain't a good liar.'

'Tsch. Bullshit. I'm an excellent liar. I just get nervous with the truth. What's up with Rogue? Things going well?'

'She said she wanted ta go watch a film with Drake. I don't think she's much of a drinker. Why don't ya ditch the Cajun and help me finish the beer? Come on, I'll even letchya bitch about your ex-boyfriend.'

I sighed and leant my forehead against the steering wheel. 'I promised Hank I'd pick up some groceries.'

'Groceries, huh? Am I that bad?' he chuckled. For some reason, the despairing undertone made me feel like a total heel.

'Dude.' I took a deep breath. 'You have five minutes to stash the beer and meet me in the garage. You can carry my shopping bags.'

I was impressed. He only took three minutes. Tsch. Down, boy. He slid into the passenger's seat looking mighty smug. 'So. Take me somewhere exciting.' He grinned. Really, the man needed to learn to use that smile a mite more judiciously. A girl could get ideas. Dang it, he really _was_ cute. Smelled good, too. I hadn't noticed it out in the open air, but in the little enclosed cab, he definitely smelled nice. Like soap and man and pine. Not like floor cleaner pine, but like he'd just bruised a couple of fir needles. I revved the engine and pulled out into the late afternoon sun.

I fussed with the radio one-handed until he swatted me away with an injunction to keep my eyes on the road. I think he chose the station based on how annoyed I smelled. The speakers blared to life, informing us that they weren't big on social graces, and though they'd head on down to the oh-ay-sis. 'Jesus, Wolvie, is that freaking Garth Brooks? You hick.' I reached for the buttons again, and heard the sharp, metallic _snikt_ of his claws sliding out. He inspected them in the light, pointedly not looking at me. 'Okay, okay. Garth stays. Jeez. Hand to the Great I Am, though, if freaking Toby Keith rears his fugly ignorant head, I'll risk the surgery.'

'You gotchyerself a deal, there.' He replied. After a silence that was just settling into companionable against the ruin of poor Garth's love life, he said, 'I wish you hadn't run off like that.'

'You wish _Rogue_ hadn't run off.'

'No. I mean what I say, Jubilee.' In retrospect, it was really pathetic, the way my vision went all golden and my stomach flopped over when he said my name.

'Kay. Fine. Sorry.'

He snorted. 'Ya don't gotta apologise to me, darlin'. I ain'tchyer minder. I just…I don't know…why'd ya go?'

'I figured you and Marie didn't need a third wheel. Didn't mean for any drama to ensue.'

'Maybe Marie and I need to go easy on the one-on-one for a bit. Maybe I'm already taking her out on Sunday. If I didn't want you around, I woulda told you. I don't hint at people like you.'

'Oh, yeah? You think I'm thick?' I teased.

'Nah, I just know you ain't a pantywaist.'

'Calling me fat, then.'

He growled. 'I _mean_ that I figure you won't go over all offended like if I say I need some alone time with another friend.'

'Another, huh? We buddies now or something?'

'Why not?' he eased himself back and hooked his hands behind his head. 'I happen to like you, think you're a nice girl, or something, and I think you happen to like me.'

'For a given value of like, anyhow.' I conceded. 'For that matter,' I added, feeling very clever when he chuckled, 'for a given value of you.'

'Yer crazy. And you're passing the video game store.'

I careened into Game Stop like a bat into hell. 'Two minutes, dude.' I was definitely proud of his accurately I predicted my itinerary. Ninety seconds later, we were rolling again, and five minutes after that, we found ourselves in the dairy aisle of the local grocery stop. 'Kay. We need two gallons of two percent. Blue cap.' I instructed. 'One full gallon and two half gallons. Nab some half and half, too. I think Bobby dared some poor junior to chug a pint of that stuff this morning, and there's no way I'm sacrificing calories for satisfaction tomorrow morning. Do you need anything? Mouthwash, hair gel…' I sneaked a sideways glance, and carried on, heedless of how good an impression of a suicidal lemming I was doing. 'Uh, deodorant?' he growled. Ooh. Speaking of tetchy.

'I should make ya pick up a box of condoms, just so the nice lady with a crucifix at the register eyeballs you.'

'You need tampons, then?' I deliberately misheard.

He blinked. 'What're…what're tampons?' by the way he pronounced the word, loud and clear and unabashed, I could tell he wasn't putting me on. Either that, or he really didn't mind getting looked at by our fellow shoppers in a way that suggested he would be more comfortable in a big padded room. Or he was just setting me up for a good hard mindfuck.

'Dude. They're for ladies.'

'Uh huh.' His blank look was just so damned cute. He couldn't have been cuter if he were crosseyed and holding a kitten.

'For that time of the month.' Five seconds is a long time to be staring at a big, clueless looking guy trying to clue him into something. The penny dropped. He blushed. Okay. Two kittens, one of them with its tongue sticking out. Maybe a duckling. And a cross-eyed Logan, but that's my final offer. Any more cute would send you into a diabetic coma.

'Oh! Whoa. Why would I…I don't need…I don't get…' he actually took a step back from me at this point. I went into cute overload for point five seconds, before steering him into the snacks and cookies aisle.

'Don't sweat it, dude. I'm pretty sure you don't bleed from your vagina.' He made a choking noise. 'Chillax. All girls do. Except for you, if you were a girl.' He made the noise again. Well, serve him right for playing country in my truck. Hank's truck. I swiped a Family Size box of Twinkies off the shelf. 'Do you really need condoms?' I glared at him.

'Have some, thanks.' Then, the corner of his lip lifted diabolically. 'Do you really need tampons?'

'Fuck off.' I muttered (Lee FAIL!), and towed him toward the till. As we stood in line waiting for some moron to verify a cheque, he turned toward me, catching me between his body and the chocolate display.

'Groceries? You bought some junk food at milk.' I felt dozens of Mars Bars pressing into the small of my back. Ouch to the ego.

'Yeah. Hank wanted some.'

'Was it that bad?'

'Dude, like I said, I figured you needed some alone time with her. Don't jump down my throat, dude. Jeez.' I managed to look him squarely in the eye. 'You can be really intense, dude.' My usage of the word 'dude' was in inverse proportion to how comfortable I felt.

He looked a little shamefaced, and back up a bit. I peeled myself away from the sweets. 'Sorry.'

'It's cool. Totally cool. Just…like…try not to be such a hard-on. Reminds me of One-Eye.' He looked totally offended, and my little heart turned over. Okay, maybe it was the burp of terror I felt coming on and was desperately trying to suppress, but I _do_ take pity on, you know…people. Sometimes.

'So do you really need to do this…Half Dead computer game showdown with the Cajun?'

'It's Half Life, and it's a video game. And no. I made that up.'

'Huh.'

'Told you I'm good at lying.'

'You just sounded so damned nervous. Could tell if it was just me, or if you were being a sneak.'

'Yeah. Well.'

'You wanna polish off that beer with me? I have a DVD player in my suite.'

'I don't know, dude. There will be talk. You know Kitty Pryde? She thinks I want your body.'

'Oh? And since when do you care what people think?'

I sighed, threw the groceries in the back seat and climbed into the cab. 'How long are you staying?' the words startled both of us, I think. He blinked owlishly at me.

'What does that have to do with anything?'

I slotted the keys into the ignition, probably harder than was needed, but I didn't turn them. Not yet. 'I'll…I'll be straight with you.' I stared hard at the steering wheel. 'Like I said, you might be a dick, but I think you're a good person, and I…I guess you deserve honesty. The thing is, and I say this totally sans melodrama, but Rogue is my buddy. Or at least she's my roomie. I deal with a lot of what she deals with, and a lot of what she deals with is you.' I paused and collected my thoughts. And some spit. My mouth was dry as the Sahara. 'And I guess what I'm trying to say is that I don't want to be left behind when you decide to take off next.'

He didn't look directly at me, but I knew he was studying me, listening to my heart beat and noticing the way I smelled, taking in all the little signals I couldn't keep from putting off. 'So…what you're trying to say is that you aren't gonna invest in my stock till you're sure I'm a sound venture.' Wow. All those big words and concepts. I laughed manically. Gosh, the guy was scary.

'You don't have to make it sound so calculated.'

'But that's what you're doin'. You're calculating how much of a loss you'll take by spending—investing—time with me. Look. It's just a couple beers, kid.'

'No.' I interrupted him, feeling my face growing hot, and the moment went surreal in the golden sunset. 'It's _not_ just a beer, Logan.' I put my face in my hands. 'I'm not just being a drama queen, either. Damn it.' I choked back memories, put them back in their Goddamned boxes. They struggled hard. 'I've lost everyone important to me.'

'I ain't important to you.'

'Not yet. You keep trying to be. That's cool, you're being social. I'm…I don't know why we're having this conversation.'

'Cause you're being honest with me.' He stared at his hands. 'And I respect that. Fair's fair. Look, I ain't a big talker myself, but…yer easy to hang out with, darlin', and that's all. You didn't haveta help me out the other night, but you did. You're a Goddamned soldier, too. Not sure how I know that, but you are, and I ain't often mistaken about that kinda thing. What do you say we sort through all the emotional backlog later an' just enjoy a movie instead of worrying about what'll happen? I have the new Terminator.'

I cracked a smile. Couldn't help it. 'Great. Now I feel like a big retard. Full retard, as they say. With, like, food down my front and a desperate need for a padded helmet and…leg braces.'

'I don't know 'bout the helmet and braces, but I could stand ta spill some food down your front.' He leered.

'Perv.'

'Hey. I ain't the one fantasizing about…what was it? Me taking you over my knee? Holding you down? You weren't kidding about that, either. Cyke gave me the evil eye and everything. Acted like I'd just thrown you to the ground and had my way with you.'

I turned the key in the ignition. 'God. I can tell I'm gonna have to unlearn how to blush if I'm gonna hang out with you. Specially if you pull movies with naked Christian Bale in them on me after I've had a few.'

He snickered and (mercifully) changed the radio channel to some classic rock.


	6. Chapter 6

Disclaimer: I own nothing herein, I make profit from nothing.

AN: I'm pretty sure that there's no actual video game called Speed Demon. Also, this chap is very filler material, and has less significance than you probably think it does.

6

Ohhh…my head.

I rolled over in bed and searched for a pillow. Oh God, I am _never_ going to try to out drink a man with a healing factor ever _again_. Next time Logan pulls out the Goddamned Jim Bean, I am going to break the bottle(s) over his head. He deserves worse.

'Jubilation, are you well?' Monet's crisp accent penetrated my skull like trillions of laser points. I think I cursed at her. 'I have…' she sounded exasperated, but with a trace of amusement, '_you_ have a gentleman caller. With pizza.'

Now, for those of you narrow-minded ignoramuses who try to beat a hangover with, say, burnt dry toast and a hardboiled egg, I have to tell you, you're upchucking behind the wrong tree. The fastest way to beat a bad come down is grease and Gatorade. Rehydrate and soothe. Takeout Chinese is the best, but pizza…well, it'll do in a pinch.

'What happened?' I groaned.

'Ya pounded about a dozen shots and passed out.' Logan's voice, unnervingly close, got through to me. I whimpered. The worrying part is that I sounded further away to myself than he did. My bed sagged under his weight as he sat down. Oh. Anchovies on the pizza. And…parmesan? Ohoho. Jackpot. I struggled upright, and he shoved a glass of cold, sparkling apple juice into my hand. Half Perrier, half juice. The man sure knows his stuff. I took long, greedy swallows. 'Ya didn't throw up, though. I was impressed. But you came in and out for an hour or so before I brought you back here.' I grabbed a slice of pizza (oh! Wild mushrooms!) and wolfed it down. 'I figured you'd want a hangover cure. You're a champion, kid. Put away half a bottle before I could stop ya.'

'Depressing film.' I growled, between bites. Yeah, real attractive, Lee.

'You're crazy.' He chuckled. 'Look, I promised Rogue I'd drive her to the mall, but you get some rest. I'll see you later.' He pushed the box of pizza into my hand and hurried out, leaving Monet studying me archly.

'Don't look at me like that, Monet.' I said, dislodging another slice. 'You totally know I didn't do anything with him.'

'I thought you and Warren…'

'Oh, sod Warren.' I sighed, exasperated and ill. 'Dude is seriously delusional about his appeal.'

'You know,' she turned toward the mirror and continued brushing her gorgeous hair, 'perhaps _you_ are somewhat delusional about him, as well.'

I narrowed my eyes. 'What?'

She shrugged. 'You're just another pretty girl, Jubilee.'

The churning poisons in my blood made everything just that much more incendiary. 'Fuck off, Monet. Like I don't know that. Maybe that's why I don't fall at the Winged Wonderboy's feet every time he _deigns_ to look my way. I know I'm not fucking special. He's got some idea that I'm good looking and that I put out, and I have half a breaking brain, and so be it. So what? I realise I'm nothing special, and I don't need _you_ to rub it in.'

She turned to face me. 'That is _not_ what I meant.'

'Bullshit. I know _exactly_ what you meant.' I sulked into my apple juice.

'No, you do not.' She cursed softly under her breath in French. 'English is not my best language.' She sighed. 'What I mean is, you are not better than Warren because of your life difficulties, and he is not to be avoided because he has had opportunity. You are both young, and beautiful, and uniform. Regular.'

'Normal.' I corrected her, with a smirk. I pressed my hands to my eyes. 'Gosh. You make me sound like a classist bitch.'

She tossed her hair and turned back to the mirror. 'You can be sometimes. Anyhow, I think you should have your own opinions, but Warren is a very nice boy.'

'Yeah, I know.' I shifted, turned the box of pizza so that it faced her. 'You want some?' Please. Pizza is an awesome way to make nice.

'No, but thank you. I am going to have lunch with Theresa. She needs help with her Spanish paper.'

'Nice of you.' I put the box aside and got unsteadily to my feet. A dip in the pool would do me a world of good, I decided, and with nothing better to do, it'd at least be more exercise than I'd get lying in bed.

The next few hours seemed to slide by like nothing. By the time I was just about to go stir crazy, lying face down on a poolside lounger with my top untied, I heard the distant sound of footsteps and rowdy voices. Oddly enough, I numbered old One-Eye in their number. I reached back and did up my bikini top just as he, along with Ororo and Hank, came barrelling into the pool area, carrying a pitcher of frozen margarita and three salt-crusted glasses. I opened an eye.

'Aha,' I muttered, shamelessly appreciating Scott's body, clad in a pair of standard issue X-decalled speedos, 'the faculty that parties together.'

'Jubilation,' Ororo smiled my way, her perfectly toned, lush curves offset by a white one-piece with the back sliced out in a diamond shape, with tribal beadwork detailing. 'join us!' she set the pitcher and glasses down. 'I am feeling outnumbered by men.'

'What're you still doing here?' Scott lounged back as Hank filled a glass and handed it to him. 'Almost everyone else went into town to spend their allowances.'

'Ah, you know me, prof,' I flashed a grin his way, 'we trust fund kids have gotta keep a tight hold on our wallets. Besides, I've been up and down Salem Centre about a dozen times. This way, I get to hang out with you cool cats.' My deftly measured sarcasm was not lost on Hank, who choked into his margarita.

'Aren't you afraid the other students will thing you're being a suck up?' Scott adjusted his swimming goggles carefully. They were probably the same ones he wore to sleep. In his big, empty bed. Ahem. Focus, Lee.

'Oh, yeah. Well, that's why I plan for them to all be buggered off to the hugely exciting town mall, so I can do my brown nosing in peace. So what're you high-ups plotting, anyway? Am I gonna make the team? C'mon, you can tell little ol' me.'

Hank chuckled. 'Judging by the control you have been displaying, I would have to vote in favour of your acceptance.'

'Yeah? Even though I got my butt handed to me by a hillbilly with a weird fetish for flannel?'

Ororo sniggered, but caught herself. She looked like she might have been drinking for a while already. Scott shrugged. 'Logan's a tough man. Difficult to bring down. The fact that you managed even so much is, frankly, impressive.'

'And without the use of your powers.' Agreed Hank. Was it the sun, or was I blushing? Maybe it was Scott's streamlined, bronzed abs rippling like bricks under…uh…flesh coloured latex. Oh. Scott and latex. _'Rogue's right, I do get pathetic when I'm undersexed,'_ I thought fleetingly.

Ororo leant forward. 'What do you think,' she asked, 'as a student, about Logan joining the faculty?'

I blinked. 'What, like permanently? As in, not taking off all the time? How would you manage? For that matter, what would he _do_?'

Scott smiled at Ororo across my line of vision. 'Well, he could teach self defence,' he began slowly, obviously having to think hard about this, searching for less-than-obvious excuses, 'Perhaps he could take on a few physical level classes. Sports, teaching the younger kids to drive, that sort of thing.'

'But what you _really_ want is for him not to take off for months at a time.'

'We are obviously short staffed, despite the teachers we take on from outside Xavier's. Even inducting our new generation into the ranks of the X-Men, we need every member we can get.'

I nodded. 'That sounds sensible. Why're you telling me?'

'You're one of the more senior students,' Scott said steadily, 'You're…you want to be an X-Man, don't you?'

I nodded again. 'Sure. It's all I've ever wanted.' Even as I said it, I realised I sounded like a pathetic rank and file android suck up. What made it worse was that I sounded as sincere as a choir boy, too.

'Then I'd value your opinion.'

I chuckled and lounged backward, stretching. 'My opinion, huh, Scooter?' he exchanged another kind of look with Hank. This one had frat boys in it. 'Well, I'm of the opinion that I wouldn't mind a margarita.' I winked. They laughed me off. Oh, well, a shot is always worth a shot. 'Do you think he'll stay on?' I carried on, getting back to the topic at hand.

Ororo lowered her eyes. 'I imagine he wants to spend more time here. I understand that over the past few weeks he has uncovered several clues as to his past, and there may be some way we can help.'

'Oh?' I looked past her, at Scott. As you probably can imagine, he's not got one of the most demonstrative faces in the world, but after nearly a decade of living under the same roof, being drilled to within an inch of my life in the Danger Room, and the past year and a half of scattered missions, I'd be some kind of comatose idiot not to have learnt to pick up on the little habitual things he did when he was thinking. Like the way the corners of his lips tightened, and how he sucks his cheeks in just a bit. 'You think it involves us?' my mind ticked over the conversations I'd had with Logan. He had said that he'd smelled Scott on that woman. Well. If old One-Eye wasn't going to let on where he'd been that night, then I, for one, wasn't gonna ask. Not in from of Ro and Hank, anyhow. Like I said, I trusted Scott. 'Do I smell a mission?'

'Maybe.' Scott was smiling thoughtfully now, thumb brushing the condensation forming on the outside of his glass. 'Would you be interested in it, if there was one?'

'If you'd have me along.' I tried to sound less eager, but let's face it, I'm a born adrenaline junkie.

'I looked over your spar with Kurt, and I think you're ready for more responsibility. You've show a great deal of improvement. It'd be useful to have someone who's invisible psionically, too.'

'You can count on me.' I gave him a mock salute. 'So you guys gonna let me in on the big-league secret? You obviously know something. Did you debrief Wolverine yet?'

Hank stretched, cat like, on the lounger, 'Well, I had a most instructive conversation with him this morning. It appears as though the technology for the tracking device you have the good fortune to observe so closely was developed by Fisk Industries, which develops security systems on a consulting basis. It appears as though they are small time weapons dealers on the side, and have most recently sold a great amount of their very latest technology to a businessman by the name of Donald Pierce.'

'Whoa, wait. I've heard of him. I've _seen_ him. D'you remember when Warren posed for GQ for their most eligible bachelors edition? Donald Pierce was in there, too.' I cast a meaningful eyebrow lift toward Ororo. 'He's totally hot, too.'

'And involved with some rather questionable activities, as well.' Hank observed. Good old Scott, with his weird ironic sense of humour, snickered.

'Maybe you're not ready for the field ops, Jubilee, if all you can think about the baddies is that they're totally hot. Can't risk you doing a runner on us if Pierce bats his eyelashes, can we?'

'Please. I'm no Allerdyce.' _'Besides,'_ my treacherous little libido elbowed me in the ribs, _'nothing's better than charging into the fray behind your tight leather-clad arse, oh, Fearless Leader.'_

'Good to know.' He grinned, as though he'd picked up on what I was thinking.

'So, this dude buys a bunch of weapons, the same time as our homeboy Wolvie gets shot up by a walking tin can, and we charge in to do some detecting?' I realised they were all staring at me, wide-eyed. 'What? I think it. I think it'll be fun.'

'Where did you hear a description of his attacker?' Scott asked quietly. Oh. Balls. Big, furry, sweaty balls. Ah, well, when in doubt, tell the truth. Doesn't mean you have to be honest.

'Oh, Logan must've mentioned.'

'_Logan?_' one of Scott's eyebrows slid up. Well, poop.

'That's his name isn't it?' I said blithely. Retreat! Retreat! 'Oh boy, look at the time. I have been out here in the sun for just about way too long. Starting to feel that tingly burning feeling. I'd better get going. Don't wanna risk getting melanoma or anything.' I slung my towel round my hips and began to walk away, and nearly panicked when Ororo followed me a little way. I stopped at the porch door. 'Hey, Ro. What's the happy-haps? Can I get you anything from the house? Ice? Sun cream? Something on a silver platter?'

'Jubilation,' she began, in her most careful voice. Eep.

'Winning lottery ticket?' she was smiling now. Oh Lord, remember me when you come into your kingdom.

'Perhaps I need not tell you that there has been a rumour circulating since yesterday.'

'Oh? What's the scoop?' I inquired, doing my best impression of innocent and probably only managing to look in need of more fibre in my diet.

'You and Logan, apparently.' Her smile turned into something less regal and more an expression I was accustomed to seeing on Kitty's face. 'A little bird told me that you had a rendezvous with him last night.'

'Oh. That.' My mind raced. What did she think? What had she heard? How could I make it look like the entire school had gotten things wrong? Because they had. It hadn't been a rendezvous. Rendezvous were what you did with tell, dark men with smouldering eyes. Okay. Bad comparison. But you can't involve naked Christian Bale in the beginning of an affair. That doesn't work.

'Is there something going on between you? I do not judge, of course, but he _is_ significantly older than you are, and not the most stable of men at the best of times…'

'Hah. No worries, Ro,' I laughed. 'You know, he's just a little stressed out about Rogue. Wanted some advice from one of her friends about how to go about spending more time with her. It was very after-school-special.' Nothing convinces anyone of innocence faster than a direct look, full in the eye. I (scumbag that I am) used one of her. She smiled, looking relieved.

'Thank the goddess. I thought for a moment that you, well…that you and Logan…and you are quite young, you know.'

I nodded understandingly. 'Don't worry. He's totally not my type.' I assured her. 'Hey, I've gotta go. You enjoy your afternoon.'

'You as well, Jubilation.' She smiled, and turned back to the poolside, where Hank and Scott looked startled and tried to pretend they hadn't just been straining to hear our conversation. I threw a last wave over my shoulder and headed indoors.

There were only about six hours left in my weekend, and I intended to use them wisely. Of course, my definition of 'wisely' is pretty broad.

Xavier's is a crowded place, even when most of the student body is out buying clothes and clogging their arteries at the local diner, and the chance of avoiding someone forever is pretty slim, so when I flopped down in front of the PlayStation to sneakily level up my character, it wasn't long before there was a rustle of wings, and Warren stepped in. He looked vaguely murderous.

'Where's your boyfriend?' he jeered, crossing his arms. He really _did_ go out of his way to look like a Playgirl centrefold, what with the avoidance of shirts and everything.

'Married to Satsuki Mitchell, last I checked, but I'm sure he'll come round.' He gave me an adorably puzzled look, and I took the opportunity to defuse his little tantrum. I patted the divan cushion next to me. 'Why don't you snuggle up with Auntie Jubilee and let her kick your butt at…' I squinted at the games spread out on the coffee table, '…Speed Demon?'

'Fuck off, I'm high score holder.'

'Tsch. Since when? I've been doing bajillion-hour service as an industrial grade ass-kicking machine in the Danger Room for the past month. I haven't played in ages. I'll burn your high score by fifteen seconds.'

'Oh, yeah?' his chest inflated in a classic pose of a teenaged boy whose video game skills have been brought into question, and he slid down beside me, snatching up a controller. 'We'll see about that. Santa Ana track?'

'Grand Canyon.' I replied, as coolly as I dared. 'Oh. Sweet. You unlocked the Lamborghini.' He grinned smugly by way of reply. 'Most excellent.' As our screen loaded, he looked sidelong at me.

'Hey, Jubilee, I didn't mean to be a dick. There's just this rumour…'

'Yeah. Seems everyone know how hot and heavy Wolverine and I are getting except for, you know, Wolverine and me.'

'I just thought…you never said you weren't, and…'

'I'm saying it now.' I nodded toward the screen as the preview of the track flicked by.

'So you and him aren't…aren't hanging out?'

'Hanging out, yes. Going out, no.' I pressed my trigger to accelerate, and quickly took the lead.

'So,' Warren's one of those guys who leans into the action when he's playing video games, and his wings extended out behind us. Thank God for backless furniture. 'You're still single.'

'As of this moment, yes. But dude, I don't want anything to do with Kitty or Marie's little plots to get me to live happily ever freakin' after, capisce?' I risked a look at him. His lips were set in a white line. Fortunately, Worthington's one of those clever guys who can perform complex multitasks like walking and chewing gum at the same time, and he quickly caught up with both the thrust of my conversation and with my lime green Ferrari.

'I'm not asking you out because Rogue and Kitty think I should.' He said, his voice only the least bit strained.

I cursed at him good naturedly for taking the lead, 'But you're not asking me out.'

'Well I will, once I can figure out how to get you to shut up for longer than a nanosecond. Fuck, you _are_ good. Bobby said you suck, the little liar.'

I careened into the lead again, kicking in the fuel injection bonus I'd picked up and blazing past him. 'So, I'm shut up. Go on, Worthington.'

'Hold on. Lemme beat you first.'

'Filthy boy.' I grinned, and proceeded to annihilate him. Oh, yes. The Grand Canyon may have been the toughest track, but I knew it backward and forward, and the Ferrari had just the right torque vs. control to take the careening turns along the crazy gullies. I put down the controller and folded my arms. 'What was that about being the high score holder?' I teased.

'Wednesday night, nine o'clock? We can catch a film in town.'

'Don't know. Gotta check my schedule.'

'Jubilee…' he sighed. 'If you're going to play hard to get, that's cool. Just let me know when you're finished.'

'Whoa. I'm actually not being an asshole, for once in my life. Summers wants to run a bunch of tests on me, and I don't know when. I think I'm his favourite little science project. I'll let you know by Tuesday.'

'That's a yes, then? He flipped through the games strewn across the coffee table.

'If I'm not strapped down to a cold metal table at nine on Wednesday night, it is.' I snapped back. He smiled triumphantly at Call of Duty 3.

'Cool. Lemme know when you know.' He flicked the controller away and left, struggling through the door just a little before folding his wings up. I sat back, and stared at the flashing screen, wondering idly why I'd just agreed to going on a date with Warren. I'd meant it, just the night before, when I'd told Rogue that I didn't like him. Not enough to date him, anyhow. Of course he was gorgeous. It's difficult not to be when you have sixteen-foot white wings. And he was fun, too, in a buddy-friendly way. And I needed to do _something_ to quell these rumours about Logan. It wouldn't exactly be torture, going to see a movie with him. No real harm in it, and I'll try anything once.


	7. Chapter 7

Disclaimer: Own nothing. No profit getting.

AN: This chapter's going to have a pretty severe direction change. Hold on, kids. Also, if I get any facts about Australia wrong, bear with. This is a fanfiction, and one written in under a month, so correct me if I'm wrong.

There are only going to be two more chapters after this one, and they're both going to be quite short, but this one's going to be another…(insert body part here)ful, but fear not! The end is in sight!

7

'Jubilee. Jubilee, wake up.' I rubbed my face and encountered the dark, concerned eyes of Ororo.

'What's going on?' I looked round at my room. Monet was not in her bed, and Rogue was sitting wide awake on hers, staring across the room at me, eyes wide.

'Something's happened. Scott wants you to be on the away team.' I sprang out of bed, slipping my feet into my bedroom slippers.

'What's going on?' I repeated, still half asleep.

'We received a transmission—Scott received one—from a contact of his in Australia. There's some kind of attack on a mutant community. From what we hear, it's a gang of cyborg creatures, with very advanced technology. They sound almost exactly like what Logan described. Scott things Pierce is involved. You'll be going with Kitty, Kurt, Betsy, and Hank.'

'And Scott?'

'Yes, of course Scott. And Logan. They should be in the hangar.'

'And you?'

'I'll be staying here, for security. Hank is going with you to provide medical assistance if it is needed. From what Scott has told me, there may already be casualties.' I watched her gather herself up regally, and she nodded to me. 'Go on. Good luck.'

With one parting glance at Rogue, I hurried down to the lower levels and into the lockers. My uniform was hanging in its cubby, and as I tugged on the reinforced leather, I took deep, calming breaths. I'd been on missions before, even skirmished with what was left of the Brotherhood. I knew I could hold my own in any fight, but…something about this op bothered me. It came close on the heels of Logan's attack, during which a woman from his mysterious past had recently been in contact with Scott, and now some unnamed source of Cyclops' called in from _Australia_ of all places and asked for help against the same kind of cyborg that attacked Logan? My groggy brain smelled a rat. I buckled my boots with a final snap, and activated all the groovy little tech gadgets hidden in the uniform—the GPS com-link attached to my belt, the earpiece that was in direct signal to Scott, and the backup weapons that Hank had insisted were added to the uniforms. They were simple and non-lethal. There was a tin of mace, a taser, and a slim-bladed knife, the blade about three inches long. I wondered whether Scott would've allowed for such means if the Professor had still been round.

I headed out to the hangar, and found Kitty and Kurt on the gangplank. Betsy was hovering a few feet above the ground in the lotus position, her eyes closed. I could sense someone, Hank, by the size of him, prepping things in the cockpit of the jet. 'Where's Fearless?' I asked. 'And Logan?'

'Pre-op pissing contest, no doubt.' Betsy's eyes snapped open. 'I did not sense you enter, Jubilee,' she murmured, looked annoyed.

'Sorry. So, does anyone know anything besides that robots are attacking mutants?'

'From what I hear, zhe transmission came from a linen ranch in zhe Northern Territory.' Kurt's tail was swishing nervously, his brows knitted. 'And zhe attack is being perpetrated by technologically enhanced humans who are calling zhemselves zhe Reavers.'

'And Donald Pierce?'

Kitty shrugged. 'Scott's contact says that he's their leader, but it sounds so strange. Apparently he's a mutant who can fire bolts of concussive electricity. Why would he attack mutants?'

'Let's just toast his ass and ask questions later.' I was waking up properly now, channelling my early morning pre-caffeine grouchiness into coiled fighting energy. 'The only question is, when will our leading men arrive?'

My question proved timely, as the doors of the hangar slid open, and Scott came marching through. You could've set your watch his steps. Logan followed, shoulders squared, jaw set stubbornly. His eyes flicked over the small, motley assortment of rumpled, early morning faces. To his credit, he didn't make any cracks about kids or little leagues.

We filed into the jet and strapped in. The takeoff was uniformly perfect, and once we were safely airborne and our course plotted, Scott switched on the autopilot and turned toward us. His hands were clasped. He exchanged a look with Hank, and took a deep breath.

'I want to thank you all for coming.' He said. 'This is going to be a sensitive mission, and has the potential to be very dangerous. We are responding, as you all know, to a threat on a peaceful mutant community located about a hundred miles south of the Tanami Desert. It was attacked nearly an hour ago by what appear to be cyborgs.' He cracked a dry smile, humourless and full of grim resolution. 'We have reason to believe that Donald Pierce, who is himself known to be a mutant in select circles, has ordered this attack, and may himself be present. As he is a prominent media figure, we'd do well to avoid allowing our identities to be revealed.' He reached into a nook and produced what looked like a shoe box, only it was made of ground plastic. He opened it. Several pieces of reinforced leather lay stacked within. 'I'm not suggesting that I'm ashamed to be an X-Man or a mutant, but this is bigger than just us. If we're identified, we can be traced back to the school.' It was then that I realised that the small items were masks.

Each one had a paper label attached to it, with a name. I found mine. It was fitted to my skull, went over the head and came down to slant over the cheekbones, ending halfway down the face. There were small diamonds of mirrored glass, clear from the inside, over the eyes. Scott's buckled down round his visor. I pulled mine on. It was snug, and surprisingly comfortable. No wonder Storm had chosen not to come on this mission. Her claustrophobia would never have allowed for a mask that restricting. I tugged it off, and, unbuckling myself from my chair, slid into the pilot's seat.

'How long till we reach our rendezvous point?' I knew, theoretically, how to drive the jet. I'd logged hundreds of hours on the flight simulator, but I'd never actually flown the _actual_ X-Jet. Scott leaned over my shoulder.

'About three hours.' I blinked. I knew the thing was fast, but that was crazy. To think that we could circumnavigate the entire globe in less than half a day was an incredible thought.

'And are we meeting this contact of yours?' he nodded, and I wanted to ask who it was, but there was something in the set of his jaw that prevented me from shooting off my mouth.

'Get some more rest, Jubilee. There's food in the back. Some rations and juice.'

'You need anything?' I asked softly. He shook his head. I decided to leave well enough alone. I found Psylocke in the back, looking through the cupboards in the storage bay. 'Hey, Betts.'

'Jubilee.' She looked solemn. I was unaccustomed to seeing her so serious. She was a cheerful girl, in the uncomprehending way of perfectly sculpted beauties, but now her violet eyes were stormy. 'How do you feel about this mission?' her voice was low, concerned.

'I don't know what to think of it.' I watched her expression go smooth and hard with annoyance. She probably thought I was thick. The fact that her recently-ex boyfriend was now after me wasn't helping, either. 'But I can tell you that he's hiding something.' Her eyes snagged on mine with almost physical pressure.

'You're _not_ an idiot.'

'You don't have to sound so surprised.' I found a box of crunchy bars, and cartons of juice. 'It's not like him, but I trust him. Scott's not going to sell us down river.'

'Scott?' she turned, surprised. 'I meant Wolverine.' Her eyes narrowed. 'What do you know?'

'Not a lot. But there's something I'm guessing.' I held up a hand. Someone was moving toward us from the flight deck. I could feel the shifting heat. The door opened, and Kurt stuck his head through.

'Are zhere any peanuts? Herr Logan appears to be having a little trouble mit zhe flying.'

I exchanged another look with Betsy, and tossed a breakfast bar over. Kurt snatched it out of the air and disappeared. 'Well?' she inquired, a brow raised.

'Like I said, I don't _know_ anything.' I pushed past her, and settled back into my seat for a couple more moments of rest.

The remainder of the flight was unremarkable. Smooth sailing all the way. I'll say this, though. I have never met a champion complainer more whingey than Logan. Maybe he meant what he was saying, and maybe he was just trying to get under Scott's skin, but oh, my _God_, he was annoying. Every air pocket, every dodge and weave, every little dip, and he groused and snarled, until even mild-mannered Kity gave him a glare and told him to stop acting like a two-year-old. He, of course, gave her a look that would've peeled paint, but he did, in fact, shut up. Even if he _did_ cross his arms over his chest and pout.

I fell asleep intermittently, and when we arrived, I was out like a burnt bulb. It was Logan who woke me. The jet had landed, and was empty. 'Come on, let's go. We're meeting Cyclops' asset.' I followed him, rubbing the sleep from my eyes and wondering whether I should think about putting on my mask, when we stepped out into a heavy, honey-coloured light. My brain filtered the calculations, and I arrived at the conclusion that the sun must just be setting. The local time was about seven in the evening. At the end of the gangway stood the rest of the team, and a tall, slim young man with short blond hair and a shiny, well-scrubbed face, with an arm slung round Scott's shoulders. About a billion and a half things fitted neatly into place, and locked.

'Jubilee,' Scott called, catching sight of me.

'Yes, sir?' When I was in uniform, I was a soldier. I don't know any other way to be.

'This is Alex.' I stepped smartly forward, and accepted the stranger's handshake. 'Alex, Jubilee.'

'Mr. Summers.' I said in greeting. Scott's lips tightened, and the blond man's face split into a grin.

'Nice to meet you. You're a smart girl.'

'_Oh, fuck you,'_ I thought balefully. _'Don't fucking condescend to me.'_ 'Where's the fire, Cyclops?'

'Come on in,' Alex Summers said, motioning to the house we'd landed beside, still smiling. 'I'll debrief you.'

We followed him into the house. It was an old-fashioned cabin, built of wooden boards, and filled with rock samples, local crafts, and papers. It looked like the superest of super-villains of paperwork had descended on every available surface. 'Alex is an archaeologist.' Scott explained. Kurt, Kitty, and Betsy were being very quiet, but they didn't look any happier than I felt. We'd been rushed out of the mansion in the wee hours for a Summers family reunion? Fuck that shit.

'What about Pierce?' I said, quietly but firmly. Everyone turned round. 'What about the Reavers? What about this mutant colony? What happened?' I felt a hand touch my shoulder. By the blur of blue in my peripheral vision, I could tell that it was Hank.

Alex faced me. His eyes were hard, glass-glinting blue. So. He wasn't some pansy-assed time waster. Fair enough. 'I knew you wouldn't be here for a few hours. I didn't call you to save the ranch. Lorna and I…we did what we could, but we couldn't follow the Reavers, we were too preoccupied with helping the mutants to escape. Those we saved are here, in the cellar, with their leader. I have a fair idea of where the Reavers are based, though, and I think they might be planning something else. Something big. That's why we called you.' Hmph. At least he didn't say, 'That's why I called Scott.' I still didn't like his shiny clean face and his cold eyes. The dichotomy was unnerving.

'Who's Lorna?' I asked, still determined to get as in his face as I could.

'My girlfriend. She has magnetic powers. Nothing near as powerful as Magneto, but she's useful.' He grinned at me. It didn't touch his eyes for a moment. I nodded.

'Do your charges perhaps require medical attention?' Hank asked.

'Oh. Yeah. Go on down.' Alex gave Hank directions, and I was about to follow him. I'm pre-med, and I'm good at it, but Hank shook his head marginally.

'I will ask for your assistance if I need it.' he whispered. It was a proper whisper, the sort designed not to allow anyone else to hear it. I balked. 'Please. You are here for a reason. Stay.'

I opened my mouth to make another smartass comment, but the low urgency in his tone made me pause. I nodded and turned back. Alex was leaning over a map spread out on a table. It looked like a physical view, probably of about fifty kilometres in every direction. We were sitting in a basin of land, surrounded by intermittent rocky hills. There was one outcropping, in particular, that Alex and Scott were studying. Kitty was looking at the map with interested, and Kurt was watching me steadily, but Betsy looked…well, she didn't look well. Her brows were knit, and she was leaning almost imperceptibly on Kurt's arm. Logan was standing behind me, I could feel him, solid, his arms crossed, the baleful inferno of ash at the end of his cigar.

'This,' Alex pointed to a smudge that looked like something had been burnt to the ground, 'was the Open House. That's what they called it. The ranch itself is called Brugballa Paddock.' His finger traced a dark, spindling avenue. 'This is Brugballa Creek. In the rainy season, anyhow. Right now, it's just a mud bank. This,' his finger tapped a grouping of huge rocks about five miles distant, 'is Warrawong Rock. I think that's where we'll find the Reavers.'

'Wait.' I said, after a moment of silence, wondering how much I should be saying to him, 'these are satellite photos. They're recent, too. How are you getting these?'

'Like my big bro said, I'm an archaeologist. I'm here on a government sponsored dig. They thought I would benefit from access to a research satellite. Turns out, it helped Lorna and me save a lot of lives.' Geez, that sounded sincere. Maybe I was just picking up an asshole vibe, and being paranoid, but…

'It's a good feed.' I said, and looked at Scott. He was watching me narrowly, and I could've sworn that his head moved fractionally once, to look behind me at Logan. 'Why do you think the Reavers are there?' I prompted. Scott smiled. Damn it. He was letting me do this. Why? Was this his idea of a field exercise? A test? Was he just enjoying watching me have a pissing match with his little brother? Why wasn't _he_ doing this, instead of standing there with a smug grin on his face?

'It'd make sense.' Alex's voice startled my focus back to the map. 'They headed back that way, for one. And it's a great vantage point. Probably some sort of cave network under it. you find a lot of caves here. I understand that the river used to flow through this valley.' He looked up at Scott. 'She your lieutenant, then?' he laughed that condescending laugh that scraped wet fingernails across my raw nerves.

'We're civilians, Alex. We don't have ranks.' Scott's tone was bland. Alex grinned again. It was weird. There was all kind of emotional subtext going on between them, but in a weird Summers way that won't bat an eyelash in the face of a grinning Goddamned tiger.

'Right. My bad. Anyhow, to cut to the chase, the Reavers were looking for something. If all they wanted to do was to burn down a mutant community, we wouldn't have had a breath of warning. They've been here for nearly a week, reconnoitring. I think they wanted one of the mutants there.' He grinned again. 'Well, Lorna thinks.' He glanced from Scott to me, then back. 'What do you say we pull the old white knight hat trick?'

'Have you found out whether they took any mutants from the ranch?' Scott stood up straight, still not looking directly at his brother. Alex shook his head.

'Nope. That's why I asked for a telepath. The mutants down in the cellar are pretty shaken up—we're gonna need someone to calm them down enough so we can talk to them. Lorna is securing our perimeter so that we'll be informed if any Reavers come near.'

'Electromagnetic field?' Scott asked, nodded approvingly.

'It's the old tricks that work.' Alex pushed back from the table.

'So, what, we break into their caves, figure out what they wanted, prod some buttocks, and what?' I said, glancing at Betsy. Like Jean, she was a combo psi, both telepath and telekine. Her telekinesis was powerful, and her telepathy only marginal, but unfortunately she couldn't lift a teacup without smashing it, and if anyone shielded hard enough, she couldn't pick them up on the astral plane. Still, she looked composed enough, and I think she was confident that she could summon enough psionic power to calm a group of people.

'We close up shop, find out what Pierce is up to, and stop him.' Alex retorted. 'It's what the X-Men do, isn't it? Protecting those that hate and fear them?' the derisive quality to his voice was concealed by something not thick enough to satisfy a pole dancer.

'Alex,' all right, now there was a warning tone in Scott's voice.

'What? I called you because that's what's needed here. I know I'm not gonna keep mutants here safe by being a good, quiet archaeologist and digging round. Pierce is _up_ to something. He has a plan.'

'No idea what it is?' Scott's tone had gone idle again, deceptively casual. He might've been discussing the weather.

'We'll probably get some hints if we figure out who he's taken. The Reavers got away with some prisoners.'

'All right. We'll interview the survivors.' Scott said, trying to sound reluctant.

It turned out that the residents of Brugballa Paddock were more shaken than anything. There were some burns and scrapes, but no traumatic wounds. A few had sustained cracked ribs or a broken wrist, but apparently that was more a product of the stampede to escape from the Reavers than the result of any direct attack. It turned out that there were nearly thirty mutants in the cellar, most with the kind of mutations that wouldn't have been any traditional defence against attack. They weren't all Australian, either. There was one young South African boy with pale blue skin and a pair of giant maggot-like creatures wrapped round his shoulders. He was idly feeding them stones and scrap metal. Another, Canadian by the sound of him, probably from Newfoundland, absorbed water so readily that even in this arid heat, he had little water-filled blisters all over his skin. I wondered what kind of time he'd have in the rainy season. Another woman, Eastern European, was so light and slim that the intermittent breeze shifted her round. Their leader appeared to be a tall redheaded girl, rangy and rope-muscled, with a thatch of fiery red hair and starburst eyes that glittered gold. She was maybe fifteen.

Her name was Rikenna Dusk, she said, and Brugballa Paddock was hers. Apparently her family, wealthy cattle ranchers, had sent her out to Brugballa, one of their more remote holdings, when it had come to light that she was a mutant. She was a fireball, independent and plucky, and capable, or so she said, of 'running me own bloody ranch, strewth.' Somehow, over the course of less than a year, she had turned twenty acres of flax farmland into a haven for mutants. It was literally self-sustaining, and her parents supported her from a distance, working quietly to champion mutant rights in their own subtle way.

And that was where Donald Pierce had come in. He'd met the Dusks at a fundraiser in Canberra, and, slowly gaining their confidence, had learnt about the mutant safehaven of Open Home. Rikenna's eyes flashed as she spoke about meeting him. He'd visited the ranch once, too. Said he wanted to witness paradise before sinking any money into it. 'My parents are good people,' she said, 'That Pierce bastard…he ain't. Him got eyes like a vulture. Carrion-feeding bastard.' She spat on the ground. 'Goddem bastard took old man Gateway, I'm sure of it. Demmed'f I know what for.'

Gateway, it turned out, was a sort of aborigine shaman. No, Rikenna didn't know whether he was a mutant. He'd worked for her family since before she was born, off and on. Probably since before her father was born. No, she didn't know if he had another name. he knew everything. No, she didn't know why Pierce was so interested, hadn't she said already?

As a leader, she was competent. She knew where her people were, even the ones that had escaped into the bush. Three mutants had been killed by the Reavers in the initial attack. After that, they'd just blundered through, setting fires and punching the lights out of anyone foolish enough to try any heroics. They'd grabbed Gateway, who had been standing in the midst of the building, waiting calmly. Rikenna had been fighting, though she didn't exactly put it that way. The words she used were more colourful. Like her knuckles, and the bruise on her jaw. And the blood on her scalp. And then they'd taken him, just like that. Grabbed him, and left Brugballa to burn.

'Boy here showed up, and his lady. Helped us get out. Blasted a hole in the building, and she held it open with metal barriers, so it wouldn't collapse. Like a bad movie, only it was happening to my people.' I couldn't help but raise a brow at the way she called Alex, a man a decade her senior, 'boy.'

Lorna showed up just as Scott began discussing with Rikenna what she planned to do about her people, as they called themselves. If there was ever an argument for the superiority of mutants, Lorna Dane was it. Tall and gorgeous, with dangerously lush curves that nevertheless managed to be streamlined and effortlessly muscular, she had flowing green hair and eyes, and the kind of features that are so beautiful it's hard to look directly at them.

Scott and Hank seemed to know her quite well, and she embraced them warmly, ignoring the rest of us like we didn't exist. I got the feeling that this had more to do with the X on our uniforms than any actual snobbery on her part, though there was a fair deal of that, too.

'Are we going to take those things on, or what?' she grinned in a way that was almost exactly the opposite of Alex. If his smile was fixed and expressionless, she radiated a kind of frenetic passion that is more readily observable in people wearing very tight white jackets with very tight straps and buckles.

'We're planning to.' Scott replied, and turned to me. 'Jubilee, I want you and Logan to recon first. We'll drive you over to the caves. The sun's set, so it'll be under cover of darkness. All you're going to need to do is count heat signatures and report. No fireworks, no heroics. No claws.' He looked over my head, directly at Logan, who shrugged. He'd sort of faded into the background since we'd landed.

'You got it, One-Eye.' He saluted lazily.

'Whoa. Wait.' I held up a hand. 'If you want me to do recon, count heartbeats or whatever, why don't you send me with Kitty? Or Betsy, who can count mental signatures?'

'We don't need you infiltrating the caves yet, and I'm not even sure the Reavers _have_ mental signatures. Wolverine can protect you if you're detected.'

'But—'

'The jeep is out back. I'll meet you there in five. I just need to have a word with Hank.'

I swallowed the last of my protests, squared my shoulders. Wolverine followed me to the jeep in the back, or the skeleton of one. It was bare bones, a couple of benches and an uncovered frame. To my surprise, it was Lorna who showed up to drive us, Alex and Scott in two. The brothers were pointedly not facing one another, in the stone-faced way I'd come to recognise already as their way of arguing. 'Cyclops—' I began, but he turned my way and I shut up.

'We're going to follow you by about twenty minutes. You figure out how many we're going to be up against and contact me. We're going to make this as quiet as possible.'

'Because if Pierce sees too many uniforms with an X on them, how slow is he gonna be figuring out where you've come from?' Alex snarked, not to me. 'And because for _some_ reason, all the American media had a swarm of footage of some crazy vigilante mutants running around in black leather uniforms. What a coincidence.'

'Shut up, Summers.' To my surprise, the voice that growled these words was not Wolverine's. Too feminine. Oh. Shit. Must've been me. Both Scott and Alex turned to look my way. 'Let's do the op and go home. I have a hot date Wednesday night, okay?' I pulled my mask down over my face, and climbed into the jeep. Logan still hadn't said a word.

We drove across the bumpy scrubland for something like half an hour, stopped about half a mile from the dark, looming shadow that was Warrawong Rock. 'I'm sure you'll manage from here,' Lorna said. 'Remember. Body count. No alarms, please.'

I nodded. The jeep turned and accelerated away in a haze of dust. I turned to Logan. 'Come on.'

We walked in silence toward the rock, and I focused on everything but how open the land was. Nothing to hide in, nothing to camouflage with. Fuck. Even in the dark, it was unnerving, and felt ballsy as hell. 'So. Any reason Cyke's treatin' you like a grunt after lettin' you take the wheel talking about satellites and strategy?' Logan asked.

'Cause he's an asshole,' I replied blithely, my system jangling for coffee.

'You gotta better idea than that. I've been watching you. You ain't an idiot, that I know. And Cyke's keyed into that, for all that he is, in fact, an asshole. He asked for you first when he got this call, and he's been singling you out since we got here. What's going on?'

'I don't know. I think he's using me to wind his brother up. To make all the statements he can't be bothered to.'

'Oh, yeah? Any idea what those might be?'

'Just a wild guess, but I figure it has something to do with…' I shook my head. The heat and lack of caffeine were getting to me. Well, okay, maybe just the lack of caffeine. 'I don't think Alex approves of the X-Men. I think Scott's trying to say that he's not the only one who believes in genetic co-existence. That there's a whole 'nother generation of idealistic saps.'

'Like you.'

'Yeah.' I chuckled mirthlessly. 'Like me.' We came to the base of the rock. It was just that. A big honking rock. The end. But…we stalked round to a cover of brushwood and a couple anaemic-looking trees. I hunkered down. 'Here.' I said. 'There are…people—' for lack of a better word '—moving round inside. I need to concentrate.' I heard the _snikt_ of his claws coming free of their housings as I closed my eyes and extended myself. I could feel the shimmering tendrils of heat, coiling, pulsing, all the wrong way. I gagged. 'They're…God…they're awful. All wrong. The heat is all wrong.'

'What do you mean?'

'I've never felt anything like it. they're only just animate. They…the machine parts absorb the heat until everything that's meat is only just meat. Like that tracker you brought in. It's like the bodies are producing heat, and the tech just leeches it away.'

'How many?' Logan asked. I paused, concentrated hard.

'Not many. More than a dozen. Fifteen. And a human. A man, I think. Probably Pierce.'

'How can you tell it ain't this Gateway character?'

I shook my head. 'He must've escaped. The man in there is pacing an awful lot. Shoving the others. And he's…younger, I think. That's their boss, for damned sure. Gateway's not in there. Matter of fact, that's probably what Pierce is throwing a fit about.' I reached down to my belt and flicked a few buttons. 'Cyclops? This is Jubilee, over.'

'Cyclops, over.' Scott's voice came from my earpiece, chillingly clear.

'I have fifteen Reavers, one human. No sign of Gateway, over.'

'Roger. We're on our way. Sit tight. Over and out.'

I sighed and leant back against the rock. 'Kay. Siddown, Wolvie. You're making me nervous with all that pacing.' Making more noise than we needed, too.

'Something's not right.' He was tense, alert. I had the mental image of a hunting dog, pointing with its tail, running back and forth and whining.

I focused back on the heat signatures surrounding us, and leapt to my feet. 'Ah, crap.' Of all the places, of all the times.

The Reaver clicked out into the night, out of nowhere, and I got my first good look at one of Pierce's monsters. Monsters they were, too, and this one…this one was ugly. It was like a human torso stuck on the body of a giant steel spider. His face was crossed by sparking wires, implanted diodes, and a mess of scar tissue. He leered over me, and raised his foremost legs. They had lots and lots of blades at the ends, which whirred like a blender.

I didn't give myself time to worry about being made into salsa. I threw myself out of the way and delivered a series of paffs strong enough to take any man down, heard Wolverine roar as I hit the ground and rolled. When I got my bearings again, there were three more Reavers, and I could feel another group heading toward us. I summoned up stronger plasmoids, threw them hard. I heard Wolverine snarling and cursing. My heart raced. Blades and energy beams and a hail of bullets, and I dodged and weaved and leapt and kicked, adrenaline speeding through me. Oh God, so many. I didn't have time to activate the com-link, as I felt bone crunch beneath my boot, detonated faster, as fast as I could. I moved in a blur, my mind had very little to do with what I was doing. Thank you, Scott, for all those endurance drills. Wolverine was tearing a swathe of destruction through the Reavers, and between us, maybe, just maybe, we could hold out till the cavalry arrived.

A hand closed round my ankle, and I looked down reflexively. It wasn't a metal tentacle or horribly modified mockery of flesh, but a human hand. A blindingly white smile in a face like a wizened potato gleamed up at me, and the universe opened beneath me.

I fell, and fell, and fell.


	8. Chapter 8

Disclaimer: Not mine, I do not make dollars from this. Or Euros. Or any currency, really. Only the satisfaction that comes from doing awful things to pretty dollies.

AN: There's some graphic imagery in this chapter. Those of you who've read the comics probably know what's about to happen. I have tweaked the details somewhat, but…I've always wanted to see this scene in movieverse.

8

I couldn't tell you where I went, or for how long. I must have hit my head. The next thing I knew, or that I remember now, has to do with a dawn. It was really obnoxiously poetic, with pale pink tendrils creeping across the horizon in a magnificent sprawl, intersecting with the vivid indigo of the night sky, against which the stars showed up like diamonds in a very, very big, blue chimney sweep's ear. It was beautiful, and despite the bone-deep ache in my limbs and the fact that the inside of my skull felt like there was a very irate little drummer inside, using his whole kit to get back at his parents for grounding him, I felt…really peaceful. Too peaceful. The kind of peaceful you feel when you really don't have anything to worry about anymore. Like breathing.

I remembered, then, that the thing before this had been fighting a bunch of big, ugly robot men, praying that Scott would hurry the fuck up. And Logan. Oh my God. I'd left Logan! I scrambled to my feet and looked wildly round. I felt my heart shudder to a stop. Oh God, indeed.

There it was, out on the empty plain, silhouetted obscenely against the beautiful sunrise. That couldn't be _real_. I started out walking, and as the blood began to circulate more freely, I ran, pounding out toward the lone figure nailed to the giant X.

It was further away than it looked. Things always are, in big empty spaces. It took me nearly three minutes before I reached the cross, and somehow, I had already known. It couldn't have been anyone or any_thing_ else.

It was Logan. His body hung limply, stripped to the waist, head lolling forward, but he was still alive. The pulsing beat of his heart still fluttered, if a little shallowly. The cavern of his chest still rose and fell, even if it was in sharp gasps, and the carnage that was his abdomen…well…it would heal, even if his intestines were hanging out. I stood paralysed and catching my breath, mind racing. How _do_ you go about getting a two hundred pound man down from a cross?

It was going to be horrible, and difficult, and probably unthinkable to anyone else, but I knew, already, what had to be done. I took a deep breath, and began to climb.

The mineral reek of his blood and stomach acids were what hit me first, as I scrambled up his body, trying not to think of what I was using as hand-hold. I gagged, my eyes watering. No. It was just the smell. It was only the unbelievable level of undiluted gross. It wasn't because a man was dying in front of me, literally in my arms, not that I was climbing up what might soon be his corpse in order to _maybe_ save his life. that wasn't it. The fact that it was also a man I'd gotten drunk with, laughed with, lusted after—no.

I couldn't afford to think about that if I was going to get us through this. I gripped his body with my knees, ignoring the way the leather of my uniform slid stickily against him. Vivid red, a little purple in places. Oh. Oh, dear God.

I retched over his shoulder, coughing and spitting and crying as I reached out and pulled hard at his hand. It tore free with a wet sound, and his claws slid out, catching me by surprise, and I screamed. The sound clashed with his strangled roar of outraged pain and anger, and I only just managed to maintain my grip on him and the cross, tightening my legs round him. His hand, claws extended, was wrapped round my neck, the inner curve of his razor sharp claws resting gently against my skin. 'Logan,' I whispered, as the pressure on my windpipe increased, 'Logan, it's me. It's Jubilee. I'm trying to help you. Please. Please, let me help you.'

His eyes rolled in and out of focus. His lips trembled, peeling slowly back in a tortured rictus from teeth stained pink with blood. His breath came in short, weak bursts. _'His healing factor must be overloaded,'_ I thought, _'trying to deal with the massive trauma and blood loss.'_

'Jubilee…' his voice was almost incoherent.

'Hold on, Logan. One more hand. Please. Let go of my neck. We can do this.' I held his gaze steadily, ignoring the terrified litany of scenarios rabbitting through my mind. _'Ohjesusgod please oh Logan don't kill me please don't die.'_ The grip round my throat loosened marginally, then fell away, claws retracting. I breathed heavily, sniffling. _'Damn it, Lee, get a grip.'_ I tapped his cheek. 'Stick with me, chief. Come on. The same thing has the happen to your other hand, and I need you to stay with me. Please, Wolvie.' My hands closed on his forearm. 'I'm gonna count you down. On two. One,' I set my teeth, 'two.' I pulled hard.

We fell backward. Well, I fell backward, spinning out of control, and I managed to kick free of the bulk of him flying forward, just in time, twisting my ankle as I landed on an unexpected rock. I heard the feral roar before I felt him tear free of the cross, just a yard away, surging to his feet. And then he fell, snarling incoherently.

I forced my eyes open. He was lying on his hands an knees, breathing hard, innards hanging in dripping coils from his abdomen. The muscle was trying to close round them, but he tore at it savagely with his fingers. His head turned sideways, and his suffering eyes caught on mine. He was sucking in deep, hard breaths, making greedy sounds as he inhaled life. 'So, kid,' he ground out, his claws sliding out and locking into place with that clean, surgical sound that seemed so terribly out of place on someone as much of an atomic fuckmess as he was, 'you gonna give a fella a hand or what?'

Five seconds later, I was up to my wrists in his organs, hastily arranging things in the proper way. It took some doing, and he had to cut through himself again where he was beginning to heal, but finally everything was where it should be. My face felt cold and sticky. I'd been crying, and now I began to shake, falling away from his body as it sealed itself (too slowly) back up. My stomach roiled, and I wanted to throw up again, but there was nothing in my stomach. I breathed in air that was still heavy with the smell of his coppery blood, and closed my eyes. Finally, I felt I could talk without bursting into tears.

'What happened?'

'The Reavers happened.' His voice was flat and hard, if a little shaky. 'You disappeared out of the middle of them, and there were too many for me. When I came to, I was pinned up like a Goddamned Christmas ornament. Alone. That's all I know. That, and we're fuckin' far away from Warrawong.'

'How do you know?'

'I can see for about twenty miles on this scape, and it don't feature.'

'Fuck.'

'Yep.' He was in no shape to walk, really. He healed from the outside inward, and even though the massive holes in him had gone, there was no telling what kind of trauma he was still suffering. 'I can walk, kid.' He said, as though reading my mind. 'It'll take me forever, but I can do it if you can.' As an afterthought, he added, 'Where'd ya go, anyhow?'

'I don't know. But I think that Gateway bloke is some kind of teleporter. I think he was trying to save us.' I stared at the ground. Red dirt. I tried not to wonder whether it was blood. It was still too dark to tell. 'I would never have left you on purpose.' Even to my own ears, it sounded like self-justification.

'Hey.' He reached across the few feet that separated us, lifted my chin. 'You'd'a been a goner. They'd'a hung you up beside me, and I don't think I could've handled that kinda weight for the rest of my life. He probably did save you, and I'm glad he did. Cause then you wouldn't have been around to haul me off that thing.' He winced in pain as he shifted, struggled to his feet. 'Come on. Let's go.'

I fiddled with my belt. 'Maybe the com-link is still active.' I punched the buttons. Even without the lack of machine humming, I knew with the assurance of someone with a firm grip of the law of probability as hypothesized by one Mr. Murphy, that it was toast. Logan's belt was gone. I stood, and held out an arm. 'Come on. You can lean on me. Let's head…' I hesitated. 'Which direction do you think we should go?'

He paused, and inhaled deeply. 'This way,' he said, pointing due southeast. 'That's the direction they dragged me from.'

I nodded, looped an arm round his waist.

We made some slow fucking progress, and it didn't look like he was healing any faster. We walked for what seemed like years, keeping a slow, steady pace, the march of condemned criminals to the noose. Well, okay, maybe it wasn't that melodramatic. There was more grunting and sweating and cursing than fateful foreboding. It wasn't long before the sun rose, shining full in our faces. It felt like it had risen just for us, and not in order to be kind.

To Logan's credit, as messed up as he was, I was the one who stumbled the most, in a dehydrated near-faint. I caught myself before I hit the ground most times, but I felt weak. I hadn't eaten since the few hundred calories worth of crunchy bars in the jet, and I was feeling it. the lack of blood sugar combined with dehydration hit me like a brick wall, and there were times when I just stood and swayed. Distantly, I could hear Logan asking—well, demanding, really—whether I was okay. I nodded. 'M'cool.' I sighed, and shook my head to clear it. We couldn't stop. We had to get to Warrawong, and maybe from there, we could find our way to Alex Summers' cabin. We kept walking.

I was focusing so hard on putting one foot in front of the other, following him as he sniffed out our trail back, that it was a minute before the strange whirring sound caught my attention. It had been going on for a while, but I hadn't noticed. _'Way to go,'_ I thought, and reached for Logan. My fingers caught on the waistband of his trousers. He turned, a brow lifting. 'What's that sound?' I gasped, my voice cracked. He sniffed, pointed.

'S'probably that guy.'

About fifteen yards away was a man, sitting cross-legged on the dirt, spinning something at the end of a string. Even from that distance, I could see his watermelon-slice smile. A sound came from deep in my throat that I'll never produce again without radical surgery, and I veered off toward the figure, sprinting, my lungs and ankle bitching marvellously the whole way. I leapt forward to tackle him when I was close enough, but hey, just my luck, he winked out of existence, and I sprawled headfirst into the sand. A sound like light being split by a musical note, and a moment later, he was there again, about two inches to my left. 'Who the hell are you?' I gasped, scrabbling back to my feet. His beatific smile remained.

'I'm Gateway. I be saving your hide.' His voice carried a thick Strine accent. 'Rickie sent me, take you back to old Brugballa Paddock.'

'Rickie.' My mind back-pedalled furiously. 'Rikenna Dusk.' He nodded. I snarled. 'Why didn't you go back for Logan? Why did you leave him with the Reavers?' his smile disappeared suddenly, and he shook an admonitory finger at me.

'You one crazy stubborn lady, you are. Kick me, you fallin' back. I lost you in the Outside Place, scared me but good. I thought you were a goner for dead sure.'

'How did I get…' I waved a hand vaguely in Logan's direction. He was approaching slowly, apparently unconcerned, '…to him? And why'd you not go back for him?'

'Lost my bearings.' He snapped. 'You found him yourself.'

'Found him…myself?'

'Yep.' Logan came abreast now, looking unamused. 'I'm Gateway.' The aborigine said cheerfully. Logan nodded.

'Okay.'

'I be takin' you back to Brugballa Paddock.'

'Okay.' I think Logan must have been too tired to protest.

Gateway gave me a look that implied that things would have been much easier if I hadn't been so difficult, which for some reason I recognised pretty quickly, and held out his hands. Logan took one, and I, after a moment of hesitation, grasped the other.

A sound, like light being split by a musical note.


	9. Chapter 9

Disclaimer: Don't own. Don't make money. Don't sue.

AN: Last chapter, kids. Thanks for sticking with me. I know the ending is too abrupt and all of this is rammed together, but…well, to be perfectly honest, real life caught up with me. This is short, and it doesn't tie up all the loose ends, but that is possibly another story for another day, if I can be bothered. Thanks again for all your reviews.

9

People don't bitch enough about Hank. It's difficult to do, sure, because he's cheerful and likeable, and when he's not in full-on snarling tear-you-to-bits battle mode, he looks like something out of a Disney flick. And he's one of those people who are genuinely more intelligent than everyone else, and manages not to be a pretentious dickwad about it. I, however, am a talented and unique young woman, and I can bitch about even someone as wonderful as Hank, because for _days_ after we returned to the Mansion, he had me either sitting on a medical table, prodding at me with needles or running scans on those big scary machines of his, or jogging on a treadmill with little sensors hooked up to me. When I made a comment about Logan not having to go through all that nonsense, I was given some party line bullshit involving healing factors and such things. Honestly, I just think Logan was being a stubborn jackass, and since he's tough, and people take him seriously when he snarls, he was excused.

I was not.

Actually, I think Warren was a little relieved that I wasn't around to make good on that date. It looked like he and Betsy were canoodling again, and in a pretty intense way. I guess Logan almost dying made them realise how much they cared about each other or something like that, and me disappearing to the lower levels immediately helped a bit, too.

What? Me, bitter? Nah.

In case you're at all curious, it turns out that I wasn't a complete douche by essentially winking out of existence for the better part of a day back in Australia. I mean, Scott wasn't actually that far away (the jackass). In fact he was (surprise, surprise) using Logan and I as bait in proper tactical-man fashion. I should have figured something was up when he chose two of the most damage-heavy, obnoxious members of the team to go in 'stealthily' when he had no idea what kind of detection equipment the Reavers themselves had. Essentially, we were supposed to make a ruckus while he waited five minutes away in a gorge with the rest of the team (ported in by Kurt).

Two things happened that he hadn't anticipated. First, Rikenna Dusk lied her little Ocker ass off. She lied about Gateway's powers, and lied about her parents being deceived by Donald Pierce. She also lied about Brugballa Paddock being a pacifistic community. I mean, it's not like they were going out and killing flatscan humans, but they weren't the sitting ducks they made themselves out to be, either. Turns out they were laying a trap for the Reavers. The Dusks had figured out that Pierce wanted a powerful teleporter, and someone as powerful as Gateway is news that gets round. He does interdimensional stuff, too, apparently. Weird, huh? Anyhow, Dusk put out the word in a dozen subtle little ways, drew Pierce down to Brugballa Paddock, and was planning to send her own vigilante force in to finish off the Reavers, once they had brought Gateway back to their hideout. Pre-emptive infiltration and strike and all that. Turns out, Alex Summers' little rescue attempt did nothing more than muck up some rather carefully laid plans.

The second thing that happened is that Logan was overpowered by the Reavers and dragged off to be crucified some sixty miles away. I didn't even want to think about what they must've had to do to him to keep him unconscious for that long.

Anyhow, with these two factors together, a whole slough of things happened. First of all, Gateway escaped the Reavers pretty much straight away, and was trying to get me and Logan out of there. That didn't work. I'll explain that in a minute. By the time Scott and company arrived, the Reavers had gone, Dusk was on the scene with about fifty mutants who wanted to fight, and pissed because her own bait, Gateway, was somewhere spinning through infinity.

What was amazing, everyone said, is how I ended up smack dab at the foot of Logan's cross. Apparently, the way Gateway's mutation worked is that he went into the 'Outside Place' as he called it, somewhere outside dimensions, chose his target, and dropped into it. When he lost control of me, that's where we were, and out of all the universes and availabilities the globe over, I found Logan. Gateway lost his spatial awareness, and by the time he got back to Brugballa, Rikenna and Scott were back. I'm told it was all Alex Summers could do to stop them from throwing down then and there. I'll admit, I was impressed. For a little girl like Dusk to piss someone like Scott off that badly…well…she's something, that's all. A damned idiot and way overconfident, but really something.

There were two schools of though about how I managed to end up with Logan, which, incidentally, collided in the middle. The first said it was an accident, and of all the crazy odds, it was amazing that I landed where I did. The others said the odds were too astronomical, and it couldn't have been a mistake, but it was amazing that I had honed into Logan then and there.

And thus, we arrive at Hank, more certain than ever that I was secretly an incredibly powerful psi, and was just holding out on him. It was difficult to run tests on this without a psi whose powers were finely honed enough to detect me at all on the astral plane, but gentle enough not to break my mind, and all the physical scans he did only showed up regular patterns of neural activity. Well, regular for me. There are those bits of my brain that are more active on me because they're the seat of my plasmoid control, but even after everything, it still looked like I was a good old fashioned mind blind mutie.

After four days of testing, I was going stir-crazy. I wanted back into the land of the living, but Hank wasn't having any of it. Just my luck, I'd cracked a couple ribs, and my ankle wasn't good either. That, combined with the dehydration, gave him just enough of an excuse to keep me down in the medbay for a couple extra tests.

I took my classes on a laptop, and since Hank is the teacher for most chemistry and medicine related classes, as well as some literature, it was simple enough to do my homework.

Remy visited, as did Kurt and Rogue, and I wasn't surprised when neither Warren nor Betsy made an appearance, but I hadn't seen Scott since the night of our return, and even then, he hadn't spoken a word to me. I felt a bit alienated, and wondered whether he was upset with my failure.

I expected him to come see me down in medbay. If nothing else, he could've given me a lecture about staying alert and not allowing the spatial aspect of my powers to drop, or something about deserting a teammate (which would've been ironic, and I would've loved to get up on a soapbox or med-table on _that_ subject), but he was just…absent.

Logan visited, almost every day. He tried sharing lunches with me, but we're both very focused eaters, the kind who lean over our plates and gulp down our food, in case anyone gets any smart ideas about sharing. Yeah, it's gross, I know, but I can quit whenever I want.

He'd healed slowly. It turns out that if enough damage is done to him, his healing factor shorts out on everything but his vital organs. Also (and this I did _not_ expect, but it's logical), the adamantium on his bones constantly poisons his blood, so between that and what the Reavers had done to him, he'd basically short-circuited. This, of course, didn't stop him from being fit as a fiddle at the end of four days.

One day, my curiosity got the better of me. I was due to be released from the medbay the next afternoon, after one final test, and I wasn't looking forward to coming face-to-face with Scooter unprepared. Logan had come down to play a hand or two of poker, and after a few false starts, I finally came out with it.

'How's Scott?' he gave me a filthy look.

'He's fine, th' little weasel.'

'You're lying.' I threw my juice carton at him. His shoulders went all square and tense, but finally he buckled.

'Fine. He's stressed out. Don't know why. He didn't have to send us into that not knowin' what we were really in for.'

'No, he didn't,' I agreed, 'and it was shitty of him to do it, but I'm a footsoldier, Wolvie. I go where I'm told and do what I'm told to do.'

'And he keeps insisting that he ain't no captain.'

'Oh, please. Scott, a captain? Bull.' He grinned in satisfaction, shuffled the cards. 'He's more of a general, really.' Yeah, I just had to push it. The swift judgment of Logan's elbow sent me sliding off the table and shrieking onto the floor. Ten point landing on ass! 'Urgh! Asshole. Is this how you treat poor invalids?' His claws snapped out, and he examined them carefully by way of reply. Whatta wit, ladies and gents. 'Dude, violence does not solve everything.' I kind of undermined my argument by punching him in the shoulder. He caught my fist as I queued up another blow, and gave me such a searching look that I felt my ribcage tighten in self defence.

'Jubilation,' he said, in a low, hesitant tone. I froze, every bit of me. Except my brain, which flicked through a bajillion scenarios. 'I need you to be serious for just a second.' I nodded jerkily. It was all I was capable of. He sighed, and shifted his grip on my fist, flattening my hand between his. My stomach did back-flips and nailed the landing. 'Things in Australia,' he began, looking steadily at me, 'they went south real fast.'

'I know.' I sighed. 'I'm sorry. I didn't—'

'Darlin', you were amazing. You handled everything that got thrown at you, even me nailed up like the Coca Cola billboard in Times Square. Ya got me down, and ya kept your heard. You would've dragged me across the outback if you had to.' He shook his head. 'I ain't never—' he hesitated. 'I admire that.' Okay. Where was this going? He caught the look of puzzlement on my face, and changed tack at top speed. 'You've been studying down here, gettin' your classes emailed to you? Is that workin' out all right?'

I blinked. 'Uh. Yeah. It's cool. I mean, Hank's down here and everything, but…'

'If he weren't, do ya think you could keep up with the material?'

'Well, yeah. Of course. I don't need anyone holding my hand.' This was getting weird. First he was complimenting me about my level-headedness and now he was asking about my study habits?

'How much would it set you off course to take a couple months away from the mansion?' I goggled at him.

'What?'

He smirked, and turned his hand just so, so our fingers interlocked. His thumb idly stroked the underside of my palm. It was awfully nice, and I think he was doing it without thinking, but it was…weird. 'I gotta call. From Neena.'

'Who?'

'The woman I told you about. The one I was talkin' to when a Reaver showed up. We had a conversation, a bit longer and less interrupted this time. She gave me some intel about a little island south'a Thailand called Madripoor. Looks like I've got some past there. I'm gonna go check it out, but Summers reckons I'd better take someone to hold my hand, be a parole officer, so to speak. Make sure I remember to come back to Xavier's when my business there is through.'

'He wants an X-Man to monitor you.'

He shrugged. 'Yeah. That's about the long and short of it.'

'So what you're saying,' I said slowly, not quite sure I believed a word that was coming out of my mouth, 'is that you want me to be your minder.'

'Well, in case I get in any scrapes, ya know. I might need someone as tough as you ta save me if, say, I got kidnapped.' His smirk is irreverent and maddening, and I suddenly feel like the universe is expanding, because if it didn't, I was going to blow it up.

'Logan…'

'You found me out there in the desert, Jubilation. No matter what anyone says, I can't believe that was an accident. And you wouldn't have left me. Ya didn't. Not when you could help it.' his eyes are searing into mine. How could anyone use a lame adjective like 'smouldering' to describe them? 'If I'm gonna bring anyone, darlin', I wanna bring someone like that. Someone like you.'

I stared at him. Then, I slowly tugged my hand away. 'Geez, Wolvie,' I struggled to express myself. 'I'm flattered.' His face fell, his eyes snapping away from mine like a bandaid being pulled hard and fast off an open wound.

'Hey, if ya don't want to, I understand.' His voice was suddenly shuttered. 'You've got a life, a future. I know that. You're not just some hellraiser. You've got things to do. It was just an idea. Thought it'd be fun. And you've got…I mean…I don't wanna…' he began to rise, but I finally found the strength to reach out and touch him, grasping his arm, probably harder than I needed to.

'First class tickets.' I said, firmly. 'And I get my own ride. Nothin' fancy, maybe a little crotch rocket. No talkin' down to me, or threatening castration to every poor guy who looks my way. No lame macho attitude.' He blinked. It was awfully cute, the way the smile wormed its way across his craggy features like the Goddamned outback dawn.

'You got it, darlin'.' He sat back, spat in his palm, and offered it. 'Partners?'

I wrinkled my nose. 'Yeah. Sure. But, dude, that is like, totally gross. And the Coke advert in Times Square is an LCD, doofus.'

finis


End file.
